


This Tornado Loves You

by ithinkyourewonderful



Series: My Empire for Ashes (This Tornado Loves You) [2]
Category: Chilling Adventures of Sabrina (TV 2018)
Genre: Consent Issues, Dubious Consent, F/F, F/M, consent isn't a plot point but an actual topic of discussion down the line, like imagine a satan worshiping demon trying to understand the concept - it's a process
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-06-21
Updated: 2020-05-06
Packaged: 2020-05-15 19:06:33
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 8
Words: 44,130
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19301947
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ithinkyourewonderful/pseuds/ithinkyourewonderful
Summary: "Is she that disposable to him that eons of devotion and adoration and exhalations mean nothing?  And for what?  He’s going to leave here here in this Satan forsaken realm to rot, all because of Sabrina fucking Spellman."(A continuation ofLast Night I Dreamt (That Somebody Loved Me)).  If you haven't read it, I highly suggest you do, but if not, the tl;dr is that Lilith and Zelda have finally started moving their relationship from the dream realm to the real world and there will most definitely be fall out...





	1. Home Has Been Found

  


* * *

  


‘This is ridiculous’, Zelda Spellman thinks to herself as she stamps through the dewy baby greens and muddy browns that make up the distance between her house and Mary’s. Her ankles are wet, her face is shiny, and her hair limp (for all the effort she went through to fix it). There’s a low hanging fog and a chill in the air that makes a passing effort at cooling her down, her heavy coat open and swinging around her. 

She trudges up the final ditch before she reaches the tree line that separates their property from the forrest and takes a moment to catch her breath. A look back reveals the fox that had trailed behind her was still there, its beautiful red and white tail (how pretty that tail would look around her neck) swaying softly, slowly, watching her with its black, black eyes. She doesn’t feel comfortable turning her back to the animal - there is something not quite right about him, but given she’d spent a long and exhausting night with a succubus, she can be forgiven for being both on edge, and utterly uninterested in whatever nonsense is being cooked up. Ever since Sabrina’s (dark) Baptism, it seems like there’s some new threat of mass destruction every other week. To be young again, she half-heartedly thinks before she returns her gaze to the plot of land before her. 

It was bare, as they had only started to ease themselves out of a long winter, but decades of experience had taught her that it would bloom seemingly overnight. She tried to look upon her house as a stranger would, but couldn’t. Too much of her was bound up in the boards and nails which made that home. There isn’t an inch of land she and brother and sister hadn’t played upon, run upon, bled on, cried on. Once it had felt like the vastness of the whole world was contained within its fences, until slowly it shrank and shrank and shrank and she could do nothing more to escape its claustrophobic walls but run off, only to end up here again, exactly like Mother warned her. 

Home. 

What a terrifying word.

Almost as terrifying as the thought of Mother.

Sex was making her maudlin this morning. Or it was the dawn, the dishwater light? Something had set off these thoughts in her head and she knew they wouldn’t leave until they were good and ready.

A light flips on in Sabrina’s room - orange and yellow like a beacon - and she knows only with the grace of Satan will she make it in without getting caught. She should’ve left Mary’s house sooner, but she couldn’t help herself from going back, from running her hand through that hair (that hair), from taking one last look at the state she’d left the other woman in, normally so composed, so put together, now scratched and reddened and exhausted. Like any artist, she was proud of her work.

The fox is still watching her, she can tell without looking back. She can all but feel the slight wind of their tail drifting to and fro. Setting her shoulders back, she forges ahead, leaving behind the cover of the trees for the open terrain of their land.

She thinks she’s almost made it when the front door opens and Ambrose leaves against the door way, cereal bowl in hand. “Morning Auntie,” he calls out, milk dribbling down the corner of his grinning mouth. “And just where are we coming from so early this morning?”  
“If it were your business Ambrose, don’t you think I’d have told you?”

The crunch of the driveway gravel echos between them.

 _“AUNT ZELDA’S HOME!”_ He calls out, before entering the house and leaving the door wide open for her.

She sighs and climbs the stairs to the porch and pauses only briefly to check her reflection in a window - her hair is limp and damp, but no visible bites or scratches or marks to suggest she’d spent the night with a demon. She enters the hall and begins to shed her coat when Hilda hurries from the kitchen, “Zelds, oh thank Satan, I was worried!”  
“Whatever for?”  
“You just weren’t in your room this morning and I was…worried.” She repeats again, before taking her purse and helping Zelda out of her heavy coat.  
“I don’t know why. I just went for an early morning walk.” She lies, shooting daggers at Ambrose who has chosen that exact moment to stuff another spoon of cereal in his mouth. “You’d do well to worry about other things Hilda.” She miffs, letting her sister hang her coat before leaving for the kitchen.  
“Morning Auntie,”  
“Sabrina.” She greets her niece, before she pours herself a cup of coffee and rolls her neck from side to side to stretch it. What she wouldn’t do for - - her cigarettes and her holder crash to the ground before her out of thin air. “Who did that?” She asks, eyes darting from one family member to the next.  
“Did what?”  
“Throw my things.” She bends to pick them up, examining them carefully.  
“No one threw anything love,” Hilda comments softly, “Are you alright?” She holds a hand out to press against Zelda’s forehead.  
“Of course I’m alrig-”  
“It’s just that you’re awfully flush-”  
“For Satan’s sake, I’m fine Hilda!” Zelda ducks her sister’s hand and takes her coffee and her cigarettes and storms out of the room. 

“I don’t know why you let her talk to you like that, Aunt Hilda.” Sabrina comments before taking a bite out of her toast.  
“Like what?”  
“I don’t know, like that.” She looks at Ambrose, but he’s suddenly engrossed in his breakfast. “It’s not very nice is all.”  
“She doesn’t mean anything by it love, it’s just her way. Grilled cheese or egg salad?”  
“Egg salad,” Ambrose calls out.  
“Grilled cheese please.” Sabrina answers, before returning to the subject at hand, “And her way is mean - she’s always mean to you.”  
“Sabrina,” Hilda comments sharply, “Zelda is my sister and she loves me.” She knows they indulge Sabrina, but there’s limits even to that.  
“She doesn’t act like it.” The young witch mutters before biting into a banana.  
“Oh love, I wish Edward and Diana hadn’t died…well, at all. But before they could’ve given you a brother or a sister of your own so you’d understand. Both of you, really.” She smiles at Ambrose, knowing his own loneliness.  
“Well I’d be a lot nicer to mine than she is to you. Did she treat my dad like that too?”  
“No, they were thick as thieves. You have to understand, they were so much older than I was.”  
“But you went to the Academy at the same time?”  
“Afterwards, yes.” Hilda wraps their sandwiches and places it beside her before she joins Sabrina and Ambrose at the table. “Your Aunt Zelda, well…one day I’ll tell you.”  
“Why not now?” Ambrose asks.  
“Because you’ll both be late for class. When you’re older…”  
“What are you both still doing here?” Zelda asks, walking back into the kitchen her hair re-done and dressed in a new outfit, silk scarf casually draped around her neck. “Classes start in 30 minutes.”  
“Aren’t you going?” Ambrose asks, rising and snagging his sandwich off the table.  
“I don’t have classes first period.”  
“Right then, off we go Sabrina.”  
“Off we go then.” Sabrina grins, before placing a quick kiss on each Aunt’s cheek before following Ambrose out.

Zelda waits for the door to close before turning to Hilda. 

“What were you all talking about?”  
“They wanted to know about Edward.” Hilda fibs slightly as she begins to clean up.  
“You’re an awful liar Hilda.” Zelda offers before refilling her coffee and watching her sister.  
“And just how was your walk?” Hilda asks, pretending she hadn’t heard her sister as she adjusts the scarf around her sister’s neck to hide the tippy tips of telltale scratches peaking out from the collar of her blouse.  
“Thank you.” Zelda mutters under her breath before taking a sip of the bitter, bitter brew.  


* * *

  
Lilith’s eyes snap open with frustration. She has spent…who knows how long trying to make her way back to Hell this morning, but there is nothing. She can close her eyes and feel her…well not her soul, but her being…get close enough to feel the heat, smell the sulphur, hear the cries, but still, she cannot cross the threshold. 

Maury was right, the bastard. She’s being punished. Is she that disposable to him that eons of devotion and adoration and exhalations mean nothing? And for what? He’s going to leave her here in this Satan forsaken realm to rot, all because of Sabrina fucking Spellman. 

Her first instinct is to blow off the doors of the Academy, rip her head off her body and present it to him. Watch him react to her destroying the newest object of his affection. She allows herself a moment of indulgence to imagine in graphic detail what it would be like - tearing flesh and skin and the sound and smell of blood - and finds it calms her down enough to think. While yes, destroying Sabrina will be gratifying (she was not one of those beings who found revenge hollow or meaningless, no, she found it nourishing and revitalising), she wasn’t about to lose out on being the rightful Queen of Hell on behalf of this child. 

No.

A thought begins to take shape in her mind, just the barest edges becoming visible, but it’s enough to set her borrowed human heart racing. It’s too far to see clearly, but it fills her with fear and anticipation all the same. She remembers having a conversation with herself once, but the exact words elude her… The ringing of the phone isn’t helping.

The phone.

She scrambles on hands and knees to the cell phone ringing from between the cushions of the couch. “Hello?”

Oh. Right.

“Just some car trouble, I’ll be there in an hour.” She rolls her eyes and wants to die at the mundanity of her current role in life. “Yes, yes, see you soon!” She hangs up as she rolls over and lays back down on the floor, groaning slightly at the aches in her muscles after last night’s exertions.

(Nether)world domination will have to wait.

  
  
  
  
  
**AN:** The title is from Bjork’s _Hunter_ and it’s like, one of the most terrifying pop songs of all time, and such a perfect fit for CAOS. 

**AN2:** I know this was a short chapter, but it will set off the next oh…13 (14?) chapters. While **_‘Last Night I Dreamt (That Somebody Loved Me)’_** was a little more feels based, I’m leaning a little more into plot development this time with ‘This Tornado Loves You’ and really trying to strengthen that… Not to say there isn’t more feels, because _(spoiler alert)_ there’s gonna be a hella lotta feels. More than either of our two lovely ladies know what to do with…  



	2. The Burdens of These Intentions

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> As long as Sabrina Spellman lives, even enslaved, she will tempt Satan, she will be a threat and a danger and she will not stand for it. No, she will kill her when the time comes. 
> 
> She will kill her out of mercy. 
> 
> Out of kindness.

  
__  
I am also reminded that women, more often than not, are the recipient of god’s intentions and must also bear the burdens of these intentions  
\- Roxane Gay  


__

* * *

  
“Sabrina,” She greets her, contorting her face into what she hopes is a convincing approximation of politeness. “How nice to see you.” She knows she shouldn’t be so surprised, but she is, when she opens the door and instead of Spellman the Elder, it’s Spellman the Younger. She would have felt her magic, felt her approach the cottage in the woods. “Come in!” She steps aside and tries her hardest to not roll her eyes as the young witch has already walked past her. “To what do I owe this visit? Everything all right at home I hope?”  
“Oh yeah, it’s just…”  
“Just…?”  
“I just have questions?”  
“Questions?” Dear Damien, it’s like pulling teeth with these Spellman women. “Questions,” She repeats with a knowing tone to the young guest, “You know, why don’t I make a pot of tea and then we can talk. Make yourself at home.” She invites as she breezes past to the kitchen.  
“OK.” Sabrina lets out a breath and starts to put her thoughts in order as she flops down on the couch. There’s a faint sense of comfort that overcomes her, like when her Aunt Zelda wraps her arms around her, lets her know she will protect her no matter what. The comfort that smells like her perfume and her cigarettes. Her thoughts are interrupted by Ms. Wardwell’s return into the room, balancing a tray of tea and - “Are those Aunt Hilda’s almond cookies?”  
“Now where would I get those?” She deflects, “Now, tell me all about your time at the Academy,” Lilith asks, setting the tray down on the side table and settles herself into the arm chair beside it. “Are you just loving it?”  
“It’s well… You know. Don’t you? Did you go there?”  
“The Academy? No.”  
“Then where did you learn your magic?”  
“There’s other schools of magic, other schools of thought.”  
“Schools of thought?”  
“Sabrina,” She leans forward and places a gentle hand on the young woman’s knee in what she hopes is a passible approximation of concern. “You didn’t come here to hear about my sunny school days, did you?”  
“I mean, maybe?” The words are sticking in her throat. “At first I was like you’re the only one who may understand, but now that I’m here…”  
“Try me. There’s nothing you could say that could change the way I feel about you. Trust me.” She twists her mouth into a smile and then leans back into her chair and takes a sip of tea as she watches Sabrina wrestle with herself.  
“How come,” Sabrina finally begins, “It’s always us?”  
“Us?”  
“Women.” She pauses, “OK, let me try this again. Lilith herself was the first Witch, yes? A woman.”  
“The first woman.” Lilith corrects, schooling her features to remain neutral.  
“So theoretically we’re all descendants of Lilith. So why do we…”  
“Why do we let men have all the power while we’re relegated to second class status?” Lilith asks, grinning at the young girl.  
“ ** _Yes! Thank you!_** Every time I try to ask Aunt Zelda, she just gets this look on her face like I’ve told her I’m renouncing and dedicating my life to the Catholic Church or something.”  
“Perish the though!” Lilith laughs a little too high at the thought of Satan’s chosen one in a nun’s habit. “Sabrina, your Aunt is-” A long list of words come to mind, but she ignores them, “Very devout.”  
“What about my father?”  
“Your father?” Her father? How the hell should - Oh right. “He was too, but in a different way.” She waves it off. “Sabrina, there is faith and there is religion. They are not the same.”  
“Aren’t they though?”  
“Faith is your belief in the Satanic principles. It’s your own relationship with the Dark Father and those below. Religion, well, religion is what Faustus peddles. Man’s shallow attempts at interceding in that personal, private, relationship. Controlling it. Controlling us. Does that make sense?” She sees the young woman turn the thought over in her mind. “Zelda, for her the principles of Satanism are intertwined so deeply with the religion of it.”  
“And for you?”  
“I’m a little more liberal.” She can see Sabrina mulling it over. “I’m sorry if I seem cagey, it’s just. Belief is personal.”  
  
Sabrina mulls it over, but it’s clearly not enough. “But why do we follow Father Blackwood?”  
“For the same reason we followed your father.”  
“My father wasn’t like Blackwood though. Was he?”  
“No, not entirely.”  
“Or Principal Hawthorne? Why did we have to listen to him when…”  
“When he was a waste of human space?” Lilith offers, taking too much pleasure to know he’s left this realm for one much, much worse.  
“Yes.”  
“Well Sabrina,” She takes a cookie and snaps it in half before popping one in her mouth. “They’re two different sets of circumstances. Principal Hawthorne was never a teacher, teaching was, is, a traditionally feminine role. Women taught and men lead. Men lead because the rules of governance always favoured them.”  
“And Blackwood?”  
“Ah, that’s a little different.” She pushes back a lock of her own hair, “Or,” She shrugs, “Perhaps it’s not. Lilith is - was-” She self corrects, “The first Woman, the first Witch, yes, but she couldn’t survive being cast out on her own. Her powers were…” She steels herself, trying to keep the hurt out of her voice. It shouldn’t hurt so much this far gone, but it does. “Nothing. Nothing compared to Lucifer’s. Lilith was human, but Lucifer Morningstar, he was divine.” Her voice begins to soften against her will recalling just how _divine_ he was, how he rescued her, sheltered her, loved her and restored her. He was so beautiful she could weep thinking about him, nothing like he was now, his pain and hatred twisting first his soul, and then his appearance into something monstrous, grotesque. “He was a Seraphim, do you know what that is?”

  
The look on Sabrina’s face makes clear she doesn’t know. Seriously though, she really must talk to someone, anyone, about the appalling lack of education in the Academy.  
  
“A Seraphim, Sabrina, is an Angel of the highest order.”  
“Oh. Wait, no, I know that. And his name means Bringer of Light as in the light of freedom from God’s tyranny.”  
“Very good. Perhaps Faustus isn’t a complete failure as an educator.”  
“No, he is. I learned that from Aunt Zelda.”  
“Of course she did.” Lilith grimaces (because of course Zelda would teach her that). “Next to God himself, Lucifer was the greatest being in creation.”  
“Even more than man?”  
“Even more than woman.” Lilith only half teases. “Lucifer saw - he saw everything that was to come, and he fought against it. He saw the abandonment of God, the Divine’s hypocrisy, their heartlessness to the plights of the suffering that was t come - imagine, Sabrina, having to go through the whole of existence with no power, none what so ever - ”  
“But Satan didn’t grant power to the mortals. Only Lilith.”  
  
A pause.  
  
No, that doesn’t seem right. Not deep down. No.  
  
“That was enough.” She tells Sabrina. She tells herself. “That was…all that was needed. Adam and Eve and their awful, awful children didn’t want to accept the truth about their creator. They were given the chance, and they didn’t take want it. You can’t help someone who doesn’t want to be helped. Even a drowning person will struggle against their rescuer.”  
  
So many platitudes, none of which well and truly communicated what it was she felt.  
  
These human languages weren’t made for a being like her. There was nothing on Earth that could put into put into words what it felt like, to be so alone, so forsaken, and then stumbling across Lucifer Morningstar. There was no way she could express what it felt like to feel so safe, to find a kindred spirit in the vast desert of emptiness that existed outside of Eden.  
  
Outside of Paradise.  
  
“What is it you want, Sabrina?” She asks, not unkindly. “What is it you’d like me to tell you?”  
“I want you to tell me why we’re second class citizens because of our bodies?”  
“Well, you don’t want much, do you?” She chuckles at herself. “Sabrina, are you sure you don’t want to talk this over with your Aunts?” The look she receives in return could wither fruit on the vine, and Lilith is struck how much she’s like her guardian. “Well,” She claps her hands, “We’ll need something stronger than tea.”  
  
Lilith rises up and pours a stiff measure of Scotch for herself, and a smaller one for her young guest and carries them back to where she was previously seated and hands one off. A rash idea takes hold. It’s so simple, it’s brilliant. She smiles at the wince in Sabrina’s face after she takes a taste. “This is disgusting.”  
“You get used to it.” Lilith shrugs, taking a sip.  
“But why?”  
  
Why indeed?  
  
“I guess you can ask that about anything. Anyone. Why do they put up with what they do?” She sighs. “Sabrina, women aren’t second class citizens, despite what Teen Vogue is telling you. You’re asking why witches aren’t on the same platform as the Dark Father - and that’s because he’s not a witch, or a warlock, or any sort of magical being. Satan is a Seraphim. He is greater than all of us.”  
“But that’s not fair -”  
“Fair isn’t even part of this equation. What is a Witch, Sabrina?”  
“I…a witch is someone who has magical powers.”  
“Not necessarily. There are magical beings who aren’t witches, and witches whose powers have been stripped from them. A witch is someone who follows the path of darkness.”  
“Aren’t there witches who follow the path of light?”  
“An aberration. A schism in the faith. They’re our very own Protestants.” She offers with a laugh. “You cannot, in defining them, define them without referencing Satan, can you? Their very rejection of Satanic belief and doctrine is a core part of their beliefs, but they still believe in Satan, if in a misguided, fearful manner. What I’m saying, Sabrina, is our very core is about following the path of night Satan has laid out for us. He has given us our power so that we may never want for anything. They called any woman who wanted a witch *. He has freed us from want, and all we need to do is trust him, love him, believe he has our very best at heart.” And how she wants to believe this once more.  
“If Lucifer Morningstar left because he didn’t want to be a subject to God, why does he want us to be subjected?”  
“Sabrina-”  
  
She wants to tell her to toughen up, that shit rolls down hill and that he’s a sadistic bastard. As for left - no one leaves such paradise. Not willingly. Not really. He was clipped and kicked out. Perhaps if paradise was on offer to her instead of Eden, she would’ve stayed and laid beneath Adam. But instead, she smiles slightly, swallowing this unexpected bubble of pain, and sighs. When she’s ready, she continues.  
  
“Sabrina, it’s not subjection if you’re doing it willingly, joyfully. Serving the Dark Lord is a privilege. Even Lilith kneels before him, reverently.” Alright, maybe she’s laying it on a little thick, but the child is dumb, and she needs to make sure everything is getting through. “Lucifer gave Lilith, he gave her Everything. Which is why, we in turn, offer Satan everything as well.”  
“Everything though?”  
“Everything. That includes sublimating ourselves to a greater power.”  
“What about free will?”  
“A scam made up by the other side.” She shrugs before she finishes the last of her drink.  
“Ms. Wardwell, you’re not saying they…the other side… Really exist still, are you?”  
“Of course I am.”  
“But like, real angels and stuff?”  
“Yes, Sabrina. ‘Real angels and stuff’. Awful, horrifying beings. Have you read the bible?” She shudders, “Terrifying. And they think the Satanic works is grim.”  
“I thought…well…”  
“Sabrina, after everything you’ve been fortunate enough to witness, to experience, do you really doubt in the existence of a God? Of another side?”  
“I guess, well I guess I never thought of it like that.”  
“Oh Sabrina - sometimes I wonder what they’re teaching at the Academy.” She sighs and makes a show of fidgeting with her cup, worrying her lip. “I shouldn’t have said anything, really. About the bible. And the other side.” She hopes she isn’t laying it on too thick, then ups it again with a dramatic “Forget I said anything, really.”  
“It’s fine, who’s going to be upset?”  
“Your Aunts for one.” She shrugs, hiding her smile behind her cup.  
“Do you have a copy I could read?” She asks eagerly, leaning forward in her seat.  
“Nooo…” She sing-songs. It’s better if she isn’t tied to this any more than she needs to be. “But I’m sure a resourceful young woman like yourself could find a copy? Perhaps in your mothers belongings?” She sees the wheels turning in the other woman’s mind, “Or from a God-fearing friend?” The lightbulb goes off above Sabrina’s head.  
“Ms. Wardwell…?”  
“Yes dear?”  
“Hypothetically…”  
“Yes?”  
“If I wanted to renounce?”  
  
Renounce? Well, now we’re getting somewhere.  
  
“Hypothetically,” She repeats, chewing her lower lip.  
“There’s no hypothetical with the Dark Lord, Sabrina. Renunciation is…a very personal choice.” She tries to control her glee. “Why would you ever want to?”  
“I had no choice when I signed.”  
“But you did.”  
“Not really, not if I wanted my family and friends to live.”  
“It’s still a choice.”  
“Well if it was, it wasn’t fair.”  
“We don’t play fair, Sabrina. We play to win.”  
“This isn’t a game though, it’s my life. And I just don’t know if I can devote it to someone, or something, who believes I’m less than Faustus Blackman, or his son, just because I’m a woman. If we’re descendants from Lilith, fine - but what about them? They aren’t from Adam, or Satan, so why do we give them this mystical power?”  
“Because Sabrina,” She’s going to hold in her revulsion at the following argument - she agrees with Sabrina’s line of questions, absolutely, but she has her role to play, and she will play it to the T. “Satan has given them the power, the role to rule and to guide us. Women, witches, we have too much power - and Satan feels that a man’s touch is best to guide us. What was it you said before? Male power and female service?”  
“Too much power though? What does that even mean? If power is Satan given, how can it then be ‘too much’? Why would Satan give us these powers if he didn’t want us to use it?”  
“Sabrina, You’re seriously asking me that? You’ve more power in your pinky than most do in their whole bodies. You’ve seen first hand what that power can do - has done - unchecked.”  
“It’s not too much though, I just… Am learning. You honestly expect Father Blackwood to be the one to ‘guide’ me?”  
“Well,” She concedes, unable to commit this far, “Maybe not Faustus. Sabrina, I know this is-”  
“A change?”  
“Yes. Your father, your family, would never forgive me if anything happened to you because of my advice, or guidance. I just hope you know…” She looks at Sabrina, really looks at her. She’s just a child, but this child can end everything she’s worked so hard for. If she had any pity, she’d feel sort of bad for this girl - this battleground, this trophy, this toy. Satan sake, she hates everyone.  
“Thank you, Ms. Wardwell! And I’m sorry if I interrupted anything.” She’s already risen, making her way back to the door.  
“Oh, no bother.” Lilith smiles, getting up herself to make sure the child gets out of her cottage as quickly as possible. “I’ve missed you,” She lies, taking the young woman’s hands into her own in what she hopes will be a maternal, feminine show of affection, “But you will be careful though, won’t you?” The danger is unspoken, but they’re both aware of who she means.  
“Absolutely. Would, would you mind if I came to you with some questions?”  
“It would be my pleasure.” Strange, for once she’s not lying.  
  
And with that, she closes the door on Sabrina Spellman.  


* * *

  
Lilith doesn’t feel well.  
  
She doesn’t feel well for hours after her guest has left. Her skin is crawling, her stomach churns, she flexes and stretches her fingers, her hands, as if she’s about to play Étude (Op. 10, No. 4) for Chopin himself.  
  
No, Lilith doesn’t feel well.  
  
She paces the small confines of the cottage, but is still swarming in, swimming in crackling, electric energy. Everything feels…off. Wrong. She cannot, will not allow Sabrina Spellman to wear the crown of Hell that should, by all rights, be hers. Her new plan is brilliant, simple, effective. Preach and deliver the Satanic tenets so convincingly, so beautifully that it reviles Sabrina’s inherent sense of justice and do-goodery. Lilith’s face sneers at the thought - to be so dumb, so foolhardy, to believe that fairness and equality exist. Lilith herself has been around longer than almost any other being in creation, and she can attest, first hand, that Karma is a figment of people’s imagination. A story they tell themselves to feel better about their pitiful powerlessness. The bad don’t get their comeuppance, they just get more. They get away with it. (A small) part of her wishes she could share this with Sabrina, save her the pain of discovering it for herself, but she’s also a little afraid. Sabrina may be ignorant, but she’s not weak. She contains so much power, so much hunger within herself that Lilith could see her taking to the Dark Lord’s ways rather quickly and rather well. No match for her, obviously, but enough so that she can see with Satan is taken with her. Maybe she’ll allow him to keep her as a consort of sorts? The same way she’ll keep Zelda (for a time anyways) when she ascends to her rightful role as the Queen of Hell. It would be an honour for them to serve Mr. & Mrs. Morningstar.  
  
She mulls it over in her mind before rejecting the idea - she’s seen too many plans, too many coups go wrong, come crashing down by such acts of compassion, of kindness. As long as Sabrina Spellman lives, even enslaved, she will tempt Satan, she will be a threat and a danger and she will not stand for it. No, she will kill her when the time comes. She will kill her out of mercy. Out of kindness.  
  
She will kill Sabrina Spellman before Satan does. After all, why should she leave that poor girl’s fate in the hands of an undeserving deity.  
  
She stops.  
  
Everything stops when she realises what she thought. Her hair stands up at the back her neck, her arms. Even if it was in her mind, she’s terrified he’s heard her. She’s terrified that it even occurred to her. Satan was the most divine of divinities, most exalted of creations, the way and the night and the ever-loving lord of the unloved and undeserving. Satan was her protector, her provider, her world. Everything she had was because of him. Yes, she takes in the humble cottage, the shitty persona, the empty bed down the hall - yes, even all of this was because of him. Was for him.  
  
Lilith’s breathing slowly returns to normal, begins to steady.  
  
He hadn’t heard. And why should he? He had ignored her, he had left her here to suffer for her transgressions. The same transgressions that had lead her to think of him as an undeserving deity.  
  
There it is again. Those words. Those thoughts. She cannot shake them. They circle round and round her consciousness. A tattoo beat calling her home to this fact, this reality.  
  
She needs to leave. She needs to escape everything, even for the night - so she sheds Mary’s skin - luxuriating in allowing her limbs to stretch to their full size and span - and she opens the door and sets out into the dark night, running until she finds herself off the ground flying. The March air is brisk and cold. The ocean is miles away, but she can still feel the taste and tang of salt-water in her mouth. She races as far and as fast as she can, but still the words, the thoughts follow her.  
  
Undeserving deity.  


* * *

  
“Sister Spellman, staying late I see?”  
“Some work to finish,” She answers, quickly taking her glasses up before she looks up from him where he stands in the doorway to her classroom. “And yourself?” She asks, watching Faustus work his way through the music room, his disinterest too practiced, too forced.  
“Oh, same. The work of educating and moulding our young minds is never done, is it?” He makes his way to the front of her desk where he spots her baton and picks it up gently and begins to run it between his hands, and it takes most of Zelda’s resolve not to laugh or smirk at the image.  
  
Big, bad Faustus with her teeny, tiny baton.  
  
She bites her lip. Hard. She’s had first hand knowledge of him, but still. She can’t help it - he’s trying so hard.  
  
“You know Zelda, seeing you on that side of the desk, it’s hard to believe all that time has gone by. You look…” He takes the tip of the baton and runs it down the side of her face to her chin, where he uses it to lift her face up to meet his. “Almost untouched.”  
“You’re too kind Faustus.” She smiles most beatifically at him, “It’s been a fair number of years since our school days.”  
“In this light, you can barely tell.”  
“One can’t say the same about you… You have grown…” She peers into his eyes while she gently raises her hand to her baton and slides it out of his hand, “Into yourself.”  
“Have I?”  
“Absolutely.” She fawns, her mind trying to find the most effective way of extraditing herself from this. “I always knew you had it in you.”  
“Did you? Even when you turned me down at Lupercalia?”  
“I never turned you down,” She shrugs, gathering her papers and tucking them into the desk drawer, “You just didn’t run fast enough to catch me.”  
“Mmmm. Finished for the evening?” He changes the topic.  
“Yes - I promised Sabrina I’d help her with homework. She’s exceptionally bright, but then I wouldn’t expect anything less.”  
“Her marks -”  
“Are a result of her mortal education Hilda insisted on, but her practical skills are unparalleled.”  
“Hmmm. It sounds like you’re otherwise engaged for the evening. I was rather thinking of asking you to join Judas and I for dinner.” She rises, and he begins to help her into her coat.  
“Isn’t it a little late for Judas to be up?”  
“Well so it is. I guess it would’ve been just you and I then.” He smooths the woollen fabric down along her shoulders when she turns.  
“Perhaps another night?” She asks, eyes doe-like and gazing up at him.  
“Perhaps after - ”  
“Zelda? Zelds!” The astral form of Hilda Spellman pops into the room by the desk.  
“Hilda?!”  
“Oh, sorry for interrupting Father Blackwood.” Hilda apologises, “Uh, yeah, Zelds. Uh, if you could come home, it would be great.”  
“Is everything alright?”  
“Oh, yes, yes. Absolutely.” She lies, “Just uh, Vinegar Tom. Hasn’t been the same since his walk in the woods.” She stresses.  
“Vinegar Tom?” Her mind bounces between options - Vinegar Tom doesn’t move (it’s not that he can’t, it’s that he chooses not to), so it must be something else. If it was Sabrina, she’d have said. No, something else. The woods. The woods. The crone in the woods. Lettie.  
“My familiar.” She explains, quickly grabbing her purse. “Yes, yes Hilda. I’ll be home soon.”  
“Great. Uh, good night Father!” And with that, Hilda pops back out of the room.  
“Well, as you can see, I’m needed at home.”  
“You’re needed everywhere it seems,” He offers, his eyes lingering over her lips.  
“I go where I’m called,” She drawls, holding his gaze, making sure he sees her seeing his desire for him before she turns on her heel and leaves him.  
  
She races through the woods, her woods - frustrated it takes so long, but thankful for the ability to expend her nervous energy. Flirting with Faustus Blackwood is a perilous, necessary game. It’s not that she doesn’t enjoy it - who wouldn’t enjoy having the High Priest choking on his want for them? And he wasn’t particularly unpleasant to look at with his strong arms, dark eyes, that hair (she chooses to ignore that she may have a type, it’s inconsequential to this dialogue running through her head). He wasn’t without charm, but he also wasn’t without danger. If he ever found out Lettie was alive, he’s flay every Spellman alive, and rightfully so in the eyes of the coven. But Zelda couldn’t have let him hurt her like that, destroy her life that hadn’t yet been lived. It wasn’t right or fair - and while right or fair weren’t necessarily Satanic principles, she still couldn’t allow it to happen. Lilith, please let her be safe, please let her be hidden and safe. Please.  
  
This pleading begins to follow the rhythm of her pulse, thumping in her ears, her heart, beating out of her chest, her steps landing on the soft, mossy ground.  
  
This pleading rings out so loud, so strong it reaches up up up - so high, so loud that it reaches the ears of Lilith herself as she stands on the shores of the sea, panting after her efforts, her flight. She closes her eyes and tries to block it out. Tries to focus on nothing but the sounds of tides rushing past, rushing out.  
  
Try as she might though, all she can hear is Zelda Spellman, pleading for Satan knows what.  
  
Pleading for her.  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **AN:** This chapter assumes there wasn’t the Satanic school play… (Which, tbt, is a great phrase to write).  
>  **AN2:** So much owed to Pamela Grossman’s “Waking the Witch”… There’s a few semi-direct quotes or references, marked with *. One of my favourite lines in her book (which has a whole chapter on young/teen witches) is “For better or worse, teen witches crave a sense of justice.”  
>  **AN3:** Sabrina drinks, under adult supervision of course.  
>  **AN4:** Shout out to my seat mate on my flight, who kept glancing over at my screen, seeing the word ‘Satan’ splashed all over it, and would promptly return to his tv. Sorry my good dude.  
>  **AN5:** This was outrageously hard to write and I don’t know why. The only think keeping me going was the thought of not getting to writing the chapter in the forrest that coming up…


	3. Your Beauty, When the Witnesses Have Gone

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> There’s a lushness to Zelda at this moment - her hair, her lips, her hips, her… Her everything was a reminder that unlike Lilith, she was earthly bound, and earthly built and she had never wanted her more than at this moment.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Edited to Add: Someone on tumblr pointed out that as Mary isn't Mary, but Lilith in Mary's body, consent isn't present, so I've updated the tags and let's consider this a trigger warning?
> 
> The idea of consent grows further and further we go down the rabbit hole in a laaarrge way, but I will say as of now, we will not get to full 'Caligari Curse' mode.

_We call “witch” any woman who wants. - Grossman_

  


* * *

  
There is something about the changing of the seasons on this side of Hell’s Gates that irritates Lilith on a small, insignificant level. The way the position of the stars in the sky shifts ever so slowly until one day you realise Cassiopeia was no longer where she should be in the night sky, but rather inches over. 

It never bothered her as much as it did to now. The other markers of time didn’t set off her melancholy as much as the movement of her orbital acquaintances (distant but constant) did. The trees begun to slowly bud and bloom, the snow logged soil begins to dry, turning from slush to mud, to mossy, mossy greens - all of which barely registered. But the shifting of the stars…? That was unsettling. 

She kicks a rock down the path she wanders in the dark before she looks up once more. 

The last time she could remember having this much time to look up at them she was newly removed from Eden, before she had met Lucifer and begun to have her world fill up with other thoughts, other concerns. He was the Morning Star for a reason and soon there was no need to look to the stars, when she had the brightest in her arms. 

She finds herself looking up more frequently now.  
  


* * *

  


_The morning light was just slipping_  
in front of the stars,  
and I was covered  
With blossoms.  
\- Mary Oliver

__  


* * *

  
As the wind that blew the last of winter away to make room for Spring, it wasn’t just the forrest that had begun to bloom.

No. 

 

From the shadows outside, Lilith’s eyes track the shape and form of of the other woman. She watches as Zelda steps out into the bright white of full moon light as it pours into the small clearing separating the satanic sanctity of the church from the indifference of the natural world. She watches as she wraps a thin shawl around her shoulders and without a backwards glance for Mary, begins her journey into the darkness of the trees.

Lilith can’t help but grin to herself wolfishly as she pushes back from the border of trees and begins to pursue her prey, in the form of one Zelda Phiona Spellman. 

She can smell he through everything else, her own particular scent leading Lilith to her, even with the all the other aromas of spring flooding over her: the moist and metallic mineral rich soil being turned over by the worms, the clean and cool dew starting to settle on the grass, the gaminess of the newborn animals being born and hatched. 

Even the heaviness of the buds as they seemed to burst open. 

Even the night had it’s own odour - the yielding of warm southernly winds and cool easterly ocean breezes. Everything was painfully, beautifully coming to life. Everything was living. Everything was alive. 

Everything except her. 

She can feel the skin she wears softening, breaking down. Decaying. It’s not just her body, it’s everything. Everything she has worked for, strived for, is crumbling before her while the whole of the Satan-forsaken world goes through a fucking cycle of rebirth. 

It’s not just the smells, it’s the sounds, the sights. She can hear the wind through the blades of grass, she can hear the pop of the flowers as they bloomed up and out. She can hear the soft and tender leaves rustling like a thousand voices whispering in her ear, egging her on, encouraging her to go after Zelda, to take her fear out on her, to find her, to pin her against each and every tree between here and Mary’s cottage and make her cry and cry and cry her name out until she was hoarse, her throat raw. 

Lilith picks up her pace until she can see - and not just sense - her. She watches Zelda as she moves through with the ease of someone who has taken this path more times than can be counted. As if by magic, a path of petals push up through the soil behind her, so soft and so natural that neither woman notices it. She walks not as if she owns the trees, but is a part of them. She ducks and dodges and slips between places others wouldn’t try. From where she purposely trails behind, it looks to Lilith as if the trunks and branches bend to her will - just a gentle brush of an outstretched hand and they seem so shift for her before proudly straightening back up. There is a softness to Zelda in this setting, in this moment - an ease. This is her home as much as the mortuary is, this is her path, and this is her night and no harm will fall upon her here. 

There’s a stirring deep within the depths of Lilith, an oddly tender longing running in parallel of her other wants. She wants both to take Zelda, destroy her and yet, to preserve her. She wants to just rest her head upon her chest and listen to the steady rhythm of that human heartbeat and then she wants to tear that heart out and eat it, claim it, so no one else could ever touch her. 

Lilith goes to reach out a hand to the other woman, to let her fingers skim over her, but Zelda has slowly turned her head to look back at her, the raise of her brow, the pursing of her lips letting her know she’s not as quiet or as stealthy as she thought she was in her pursuits. 

Lilith feels her mouth go dry taking in the other woman, still looking at her over her shoulder, still not speaking. It’s clear Zelda can read her mind, even if Lilith herself is only half-aware of what thoughts are there. There’s a lushness to Zelda at this moment - her hair, her lips, her hips, her… Her everything was a reminder that unlike Lilith, she was earthly bound, and earthly built and she had never wanted her more than at this moment. With a gentle cock of her head, Zelda invites Lilith to join her side, and near-helpless, she makes her way, trampling the freshly blooming flowers that has sprout up in seconds, all the way from the church to the swing to where they are now. Her fingers reach out and cling to the curve of Zelda’s waist, Lilith draws their bodies together, pressed back to front and she just breathes in the other woman, the night, this moment. Her lips begin to move against the back of her neck, to the lobe of her ear. She continues this way, savouring the skin beneath her teeth, her tongue, before Zelda releases a soft mewl and steps out of Lilith’s grasp and continues on her journey - a little slower this time, making room for her companion to walk alongside her. 

Lilith is confused as Zelda slips her left hand in her right, but can’t make sense of it. It’s almost as if she’s bewitched by everything tonight. It’s too many sensations, too many senses being used at once. Too many patches of white light and inky darkness, too many flowers and breezes, too many sounds and smells and just too many everything conspiring to make her dizzy, make her weak.

And Zelda at her right, grounding her, focusing her, keeping her here in the forest, in the moment. 

The space between the trees begins to narrow, becoming even smaller than they were before, and yet they each bow and bend to make room for the lovers as they walk the path they’ve laid out for themselves. In her haze, Lilith wonders once more about the Spellmans and their powers, their strengths. Their origins. Surely they weren’t an ordinary family of witches - their possession of a Cain Pit speaks to that - Sabrina was an untapped source of power, the exorcism proved that. Edward was a scholar of untold possibilities. When Zelda sang, Lilith would swear she’d been born a siren but here, in this light, in this copse of trees, Zelda was part woodland nymph. She must be something more than witch - no witch had ever been like this.  
she feels a slight tug at her arm drawing her attention. Her eyes float up and she sees Zelda looking at her like no being has looked at her. 

No, that’s not entirely true. 

Her stomach churns and she suddenly takes her hand back from Zelda’s as if she’s been burned, but she doesn’t know why. She doesn’t know why she did. “Mary?” Zelda finally drawls, her voice harmonising with the rushing water of the small stream in the distance.  
“Mmmm?” Lilith answers, “Yes.”  
“If you’d like me to go, I can - I would hate to burden you with my company.” There it is, a sing drop of wounded pride buried deep in the amused tone.  
“Hardly a burden,” Lilith lies, grinning. She feels like a pantomime of herself, but refuses to continue allowing her insides to roll about endlessly. “I was just thinking was all…”  
“About?”  
“You.” She confesses, knowing the best way to lie is to wrap it a truth, She locks eyes with the other woman and shamelessly describes what she will do once they return to her cottage. Her obscenities are so bold, so amazing, so fantastic that Zelda can’t help but laugh, her voice deep and heady with her own desire, “Awfully sure of yourself, aren’t you?”  
“Don’t I have every right to be?”  
“Remains to be seen,” Zelda shrugs before she leans over and drops her voice and her lips to Lilith’s neck, placing a long and lazy lick of the tongue up the tight muscle to the shell of her ear, “Besides, you’ll have to catch me first.”  
“Haven’t I caught you already?” She asks, with so much confidence it just spurs Zelda to step out of Mary’s embrace and disappear into the forrest in what felt like a blink.

“Zelda,” Lilith calls out, “I’m not playing this game.”

Silence.

“I’m not going to run after you.” She continues, peering behind trees and shadows in an effort to find her. “We’re not children…” She hears splashing - she’s crossed the stream. 

Well.

Lilith refuses to chase after her like a child. It’s one thing to hunt her like prey, another entirely to … to do this. She makes it to the water and sees Zelda on the other side of the stream bank, looking over at her, and just watching. “I hope you’re wet,” Lilith calls out, sidestepping her way down the stream, before dipping her toe in. “I hope you’re wet and cold.” She continues, plunging suddenly knee deep into the icy, rushing water, her eyes never wavering from the black and white form of Zelda before her. When she’s half-way across, Zelda’s face breaks into a grin, and she returns to their game. Lilith scrambles out of the moonlit water, but it’s too late, Zelda’s ahead of her, she can see her hair waving through the trees like a white flag. Her blood boils with competition and she all but chokes on her own desire for her. Zelda runs with knowledge and grace - this is her forest, this is her body, this is her earth and her world - while Lilith gives chase using instinct and brute, animal strength to make up for the clumsiness of being a visitor in this realm, this town, this body. If Lilith is the wolf, it doesn’t make Zelda the lamb - far from it. She wants to make an analogy to Artemis, but she isn’t sure how it would fit: hunter and prey, goddess and retinue. No, she steps out of her wet shoes (ruined), picks up the hem of her sodden skirt and begins to give chase, pushing her legs, her lungs to their limit. Her face can’t help but break into a smile - she doesn’t know why. She can feel the branches and twigs pulling and tugging at her hair and her clothes, no longer making way for her as they did for Zelda, but still she is filled with a lightness, an unknown ache that only spreads as she hears Zelda’s laughter up ahead. 

But there’s something else. Her heart speeds up. She hears a voice, familiar, more familiar than her own. His voice is calling for her. Calling for her by her true name. 

She presses, presses, presses on - stumbling into the clearing in front of her cottage as if her body no longer knew what to do without the obstacles it had dodged - but there was no one waiting for her. There was nothing, there was no one. She spins around, “Zelda?” She couldn’t still be in the forrest, could she? She had a head start, she had taken the path too often to have gotten lost. “Zelda?” She continues to turn, “Zelda?” She calls out again, her lightness growing leaden, her heart beat growing erratic. “Zelda!” Had he been here? Had it really been his voice? Had he - 

“Worried?” Zelda asks, appearing in front of her like magic. Like a witch. Lilith cannot bring herself to answer, not having the words to explain that she wasn’t, she couldn’t worry about a person she couldn’t care less about. Rather she pulls the other woman towards her and kisses her hardly, as if to pin her to the very earth beneath their feet. As they continue, the lightness in Lilith’s chest returns, the ache shifts once more, ever present but indescribable. Arms wrapped around the other’s shoulders like teenagers, like beings much younger, much happier, then either of them were. 

They move, still in a messy embrace towards the porch, until Zelda has backed Mary onto the steps, using her body to push her up the stairs - one at a time, until Mary misses a step and stumbles, laughing, bringing both of them down in an undignified heap. Their bodies will be pain tomorrow, their limbs red and scratched and bruised, their muscles aching and sore. Right now, neither of them care. Zelda plants a thigh on either side of Mary and begins to undo the other woman’s buttons before giving up with the fiddly buttons and stripping the silk blouse up and over her head, leaving the woman beneath her topless. Zelda grins down at her and relishes this moment, savours this opportunity to have Mary pinned between her body and the stairs. For everything she had said earlier, here she is, powerless. The thought alone leaves Zelda wet and wanting. She lowers her head to Mary’s where they kiss once more, all hard teeth and soft flesh. Zelda feels the sharpness of Mary’s bones poke into her flesh. She feels Mary’s hands grasp at her garters, half trying to undo them, half clutching them for dear life. She feels Mary’s skin, cooling in dewy air. She feels the warm breeze blowing from the south and tangling in their legs and fingers.

She feels.

She feels like a teenager, positively bacchanalian running through the forrest and then fucking her lover on the steps under the moon, the sky, and all of Satan’s creations. The thought imbues Zelda’s actions with an almost holy reverence, as if this is all for Lilith. It feels it must be ordained by her, there can be no other explanation for her own actions, can there?

Lilith cannot think straight. 

She can barely think at all. 

Something has taken hold of her and she cannot put a name to it, it’s on the tip of her tongue, much like Zelda. She lets the human do whatever she wants to her and she doesn’t know why. She lets Zelda devour her flesh with her lips and tongue and teeth on every inch of skin she can reach. She lets Zelda enter her, and curl her fingers, and she lets her own body rock and shudder beneath the other woman’s. She even lets Zelda whisper to her, words as sharp as her teeth, words that tell her how beautiful she is like this, how incredible she feels, how good she is. The words fill her more than the other woman’s hand and she has no idea why the praise sends shivers down her whole body - leaving her tongue-tied and fisted. Her own hands claw at Zelda’s thighs, tangling in the garter clips, digging half-moons into the pale flesh. Her legs are wrapped somehow, somewhere along Zelda’s body, anything to get close, close, closer to her. She feels positively primal, close to coming undone. Her mind jumps from thought to thought, each one an unrelated fragment. Despite being pinned down and pawed at, the power she feels at submitting to ministrations of Zelda Spellman makes her feel…incomprehensibly powerful herself. She can feel the adoration, the worship being poured into her. Her mind recalls being worshiped like this centuries ago, she recalls worshiping Lucifer like this. 

Lucifer Morningstar.

No, no she won’t let him in to this moment. He may have her past and her future, but right now, this moment is hers. Zelda, in her wild devotion, is hers. She will relish her without shame. She forces her eyes open, to take in the sight of Zelda Spellman hovering above her, everything hidden by the shadows except for the white of her teeth, peeking out of a grin. Knowing she’s being watched, Zelda’s smile spreads wider as she sinks further down Mary’s body, past her breasts and her belly, until she disappears between the folds of stream-wet fabric bunching at Lilith’s hips. Lilith’s eyes open wider (wider than her legs) at the feel of Zelda lapping her up with the same ferocious intensity as her fingers working within her. 

The air in her lungs chokes her - her body isn’t sure if it should breathe in or breathe out. 

It really isn’t sure of anything. 

Her hands clasp and catch in the long copper strands and she tugs harder than she should. Her hips rolling like the ocean tide further into Zelda’s hands and mouth. She edges closer and closer to the peak of her desire - she can already feel the drop, her stomach tightens and incomprehensible half-thoughts run through her mind in languages so dead not even Zelda would recognise them. Still, Zelda continues her rhythmic devotion upon the body of other woman - as if she herself was Lilith, feasting upon an offering. There is nothing on any realm that could make her give up before she hears Mary come undone beneath her. Before she hears the other woman’s howl echo into the spring night. Before she praises her softly, quietly, in the soft moments between bouts. Feeling the other woman tighten beneath her, around her, Zelda changes her tact - using a silky soft scrape of her teeth to the tender flesh - and suddenly everything stills but Mary gasping for breath, gasping for breath, gasping for release from the waves of sensation suddenly taking over her entire body. Lilith digs into to Mary’s body, the pleasure it’s currently feeling - she allows herself to feel it all as it really was her - every spasm, every too tender nerve, the wind on her flush skin, the slight ringing in her ears, her racing heart. She focuses on these sensations, she blocks out the thoughts trying to break in, of Lucifer’s transformation into Satan, into every time it hurt and left her hollowed out and empty, of the fact that this wasn’t her body, not really. No, she digs further into Mary Wardwell’s body and makes herself feel Zelda’s hair tickling her belly, the whispered kisses being left on the delicate skin between her thighs. 

She makes herself feel every last thing and everything fucking hurts.

Panic begins to set in, and no matter what she tries to do, it bubbles up inside her between her skin and Mary’s. She tries to breathe, she tries to regain her control. She tries to pull together the parts of her that have come undone and she fears she’s failing miserably. Zelda gently pulls her hand out from where it had been nestled and rises up so she’s no longer prone and uses the back of her dampened hand to wipe her chin dry before gazing down at her beatifically. It’s this act, absurd and beautiful, that pulls Lilith out of her panicked spiral. It aches deep inside to look at her, to see Zelda, her hair burnished gold, her red lipstick smeared all over, her posture and her air as if she were standing before Satan himself instead of having just fucked her three ways from Sunday. Zelda merely raises a brow as she locks eyes with Lilith, wiping her hand clean enough on Lilith’s own skirt before bend over and placing a kiss on her lips. There is no teasing or taunting, only lips upon lips, tongue upon tongue. She can taste her own sourness in Zelda’s mouth, and it makes her want the other woman again and again and again. She must’ve made a small noise, a mewl, a growl, because Zelda pulls back and out of the kiss and looks down at her. The moment drags on - part of Lilith hates every second of it, she is the Mother of Everything, and she should not have to feel like begging this human witch to touch her, but the other part, well, the other part just wants more of this. More of Zelda. More of feeling and less of it at the same time. After another long, unblinking moment, Zelda places a finger beneath Mary’s chin and firmly, insistently guides her upright so she’s sitting on the step above the one Zelda kneels upon. 

They’re eye to eye now, and another moment passes. 

Zelda relishes the po wer she is taking, and Lilith begrudgingly enjoys giving in to her. 

Mary can’t tear her eyes off the other woman as she takes her right hand and raises it to her mouth. She places her own two fingers in her mouth as if it were no different than a biscuit at an afternoon tea. Mary’s mouth goes dry as she watches the red lips part and the fingers emerge when wet. “You aren’t done yet, are you?” Zelda asks, faux confusion across her face. Unable to speak, Lilith nods no and is rewarded with a throaty “Good. Because I want to hear you this time.” Lilith knows should hate herself and her borrowed body’s response, but then there’s the sensation of being filled again, of Zelda's whiskey voice speaking to her. What she's saying, she isn't sure. She isn't sure of much. 

Something about being good. 

Being hers. 

She knows she's looking into her eyes, she can her lips move, but for the love of Satan, she can't make heads or tails of the words. She just knows she feels amazing. Better than she has any right to feel. She feels every inch of being primal, being Lilith, and it feels good. She throws an arm around the other woman's shoulder and closes the distance between them, practically in her lap. She still can't parse out Zelda's words - for all she knows, the witch could be casting a spell over her - she wouldn't doubt it the way her body keeps rolling towards the other's. She feels Zelda's rhythm gain speed, go deeper, go harder, but still their eyes are locked, they are in this together. Lilith feels the pressure within build, every muscle winds tighter and tighter. All she feels is Zelda, all she hears is her, all she smells is her, all she sees is her... And she looks fucking glorious, face smeared with a red as dark as blood, the moon hanging like a halo behind her, her bone white teeth glowing as she grins wickedly. She looks every inch a companion and consort to Satan should look - her distracted thoughts split between imagining Zelda as her own consort, and wondering why Satan hasn't chosen Zelda instead of Sabrina - but as each tangent spirals across her mind, it's too late, her body can take no more and relief is at (Zelda's) hand as she takes Mary's wracking body into her free arm and lets Mary rest her head on her shoulder as she first comes and then comes to. 

Finally there's silence - not just between them, but across the whole of the forrest. 

And then once more, Zelda removes her hand from within Mary and Mary off her shoulder and rises abruptly, gleefully. "I don't know about you," She begins, "But I'm parched." And she walks past Mary and climbs the rest of the porch stairs where she manages to open the locked door (Lilith doesn’t want to give too much thought to this) and heads inside, leaving the door open behind her. 

Zelda misses the geese flying back north, which is fine, she’s seen them more than she would ever care to (they’re vermin after all), but Lilith watches their formation as they fly, and she is awe-struck. 

She knows she should move, go in, but right now she's collecting herself. It's like she's seeing everything through a different lens, and in a way, she is. She's fucked and been fucked by more beings than she can remember, in a variety of locations, situations and positions - but this, this one she wants to lock away somewhere deep within her bones and hold on to it. Her gaze follows the path of purple flowers trailing along the border of the forrest to where the porch steps began and while something about that seems odd, she's entirely too dazed to care. 

Eventually she rises and follows Zelda in, still only half present, half focused. The door closes behind, the (ruined) skirt drops onto the floor. A pinprick of light glows from the kitchen, where she finds Zelda staring into the open fridge. "Didn't you get enough to eat earlier?" She asks, standing close behind, one hand on the other woman's hip again. "I seemed to work up an appetite, didn't you?" Zelda mutters, eyes not landing on anything edible, desirable. "Want me to cook something?" Lilith asks, sweet insincerity in every word.  
"You don't cook." Zelda shoots, glad that Mary can’t see her smile.  
"Neither do you, but you’re poking around as if you’re going to cook something.”  
"Fair enough." Zelda agrees, turning into Mary's arms.  
"Want to run off with me?"  
"Only if there's food."  
"We can bring Hilda?"  
"We are not bringing my sister."  
"We'll go hungry..." Lilith warn.  
"Fine, Hilda can visit."  
"I knew you'd see it my way," Lilith gloats, licking her thumb and running it along the smeared lipstick, trying to clean it but only making it worse. "And speaking of my way..." She steps closer to the other woman before she begins to have her way with her, stripping her out of her damp clothes, out of her torn and sagging stockings, out of her sodden undergarments. This time they are lit not by the moon, but the light of the refrigerator, both relishing the artificial cool air on their bodies growing more and more flush with every touch, every lap, every lick and kiss. 

With the pressure of the first, tentative nights of their couplings gone, they discover they are free to laugh, to tease, to have fun. Lilith uses this as a new opportunity to use Mary's body in new, creative ways. Every feeling different enough, new enough to distract her from her true purpose for a moment. It was like dancing with a new partner - the moves are familiar, but the sensations are entirely new and utterly delicious. 

For Zelda, there was the pleasure of going round for round with a partner who isn't afraid of her, someone who means nothing to her, and to whom she means nothing. Looking into the dark shadows that fell into Mary's eyes, Zelda knows she should be more careful with a demon like Mary. She knows this, and still, as Mary bends her over against the counter, still she begs for more, more, more of her. 

And the more Lilith has Zelda, the more she wants her. Her siren turned succubus. How she would love to shed Mary's skin and ease into Zelda's, slip into her soul as she slips into her body.  


* * *

  
As the moon sets and the sky begins to lighten - the kitchen walls dappled in the dawn light, Lilith proudly offers Zelda a breakfast of half-melted ice cream and cereal. Zelda laughs as she takes a spoonful. She calls it awful. She puts on what’s left of her clothes, and then she kisses her lover goodbye and she leaves. 

Watching her disappear into the dark woods, the deep ache begins again within Lilith.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **AN1:** No, I didn’t forget about the previous scene…  
>  **AN2:** When Zelda wipes her mouth I just really need you remember that scene where she had to pull the frog out of her mouth…  
>  **AN3:** There are certain words I hate to write… It just feels like when you say the word ‘dongle’… Forgive me. I think I managed to use it once and was unable to spell it the alternative way, and I’m ok with that. It’s called compromise :)  
>  **AN4:** The title is from Leonard Cohen, because who else but that man understood sin and women...?


	4. A Small Cough

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> He had always known they were destined to be together, even when they were in school and she had hardly paid him any attention. Even when she had disappeared, and he was forced by his parents and propriety to marry Constance (lovely as she was). There was always something between them - destiny, divinity, desire - and now their relationship has been blessed and demanded by no less than the Dark Lord himself. 
> 
> Zelda would be his, finally and rightfully, as she should've been all along.

As it has been said:  
Love and a cough  
cannot be concealed.  
Even a small cough.  
Even a small love.  
\- Small Wire, Anne Sexton 

  


* * *

  
Dear Satan, this affair was taking its toll on her, or at the very least, her shoes. She could only find one from where she kicked it off the night before as she set off running. She knew the other one should've been there, but only one was found beneath a tangle of crushed leaves and petals. She resists the urge to snap a bloom off, to tuck it behind her ear. To laugh. To let out some of this energy swirling within her. Around her.

She's acting childish. 

She sighs, writing off the lost shoe, and picks up her pace on her walk home. It's one thing to be up all night with a succubus, and it's entirely another to look like you'd been up all night with a succubus. 

She can smell sex all over her. She knows the first thing she needs to do as she gets in is to get into the bath - scrub Mary off every part of her. She doesn't even acknowledge the part of her that wishes she can stay wrapped in the smell of sex and sweat and Mary. She had survived this long with this technique of denial, she wasn't about to try something new, something absurd such as acknowledging reality and her growing feelings. 

Absolutely not. 

She absolutely wasn't going to wonder just what it was about Mary that sets her off like this. She certainly isn't going to try to name the feelings brewing beneath her skin. 

She'd say it was shame, but Zelda hadn't felt shame since her mother finally died (praise Satan for that sweet release) (as well as the equally sweet release Jonas Greenley provided afterwards). As the point of existence was to enjoy every experience the Dark Lord provided, the Church of Night didn't believe in shame (Though Vesta Spellman certainly did). No, it was a compulsion to keep Mary hidden, separate - to keep who she was with Mary separate. 

Satan, what got into her last night? In the forrest, where just anyone could've seen them. 

If she asked the questions of herself that she very clearly wasn't going to ask, she would say that her objection to her dalliances with Mary Wardwell becoming public knowledge were much simpler - this woman was a stranger, and strangers weren't to be trusted. It took families generations to be considered part of the Church. Mary was a liar, a newcomer, and yes, they tolerated her presence, but she wouldn't be accepted for another hundred and fifty years. Zelda wasn't about to associate publicly, or be known cavorting with her, thereby risking her own position, her own power, as dwindling as it was. 

She shouldn't have done it.

She shouldn't have done any of it. Last night, or this morning. What was she thinking? 

She has to put this behind her, she tells herself. She will. She had an itch, it was scratched, and now she's done. She put herself at risk last night, and again this morning. She's half-way up the path to home the she realises she hasn't looked up, hasn't checked who's awake. She will cheerfully murder Ambrose if he says anything, Sabrina too. A quick glance reveals all the lights are still off, but she knows she's cutting it close. She pads barefoot up the stairs and slips into the house, about to close the door silently when a - "Oh, Praise Satan!" - startles her into slamming it shut.  
"Damn it Hilda, you scared me." She scolds her sister sitting in the side room, waiting for her.  
"Well what do you think you did to me last night? I didn't know where you were, and you never came home." Hilda makes her way to the hall and takes in the sight of her sister who looks like she's absolutely been through the wars. "You are all right, aren't you?" She asks, confused.  
"Yes, don't be dramatic, of course I'm all right." Zelda responds, trying to ignore her horrifying reflection in the hallway mirror.   
"So a good night with Mary then?" Hilda asks as she pulls out a handkerchief and tries to wipe her sister’s smudged lipstick away. The way she smiles at Zelda, so wide and so pure, makes her stomach roil. What right did her little sister have to ask? To bring to light what she was trying to hide. "I'm going for a bath." Zelda mutters, walking past the other woman and up the stairs. "Zelds," Hilda says, her voice so full of compassion, sincerity that it makes Zelda sick. "It's ok."  
"What is?"  
"To be happy. You're allowed to be happy you know."

Happy. The word sticks in her gut like a knife.

"They'd want you to be."  
"Don't." Zelda says sharply, refusing to turn around, to let Hilda see her like this, tears brimming in the corners of her eyes. She wants to say so many other things. She wants to be able to cry on Hilda's shoulder, she wants to tell her she can't possibly have known what they would've wanted, or if she was in fact, ever going to be allowed to be happy. She wants to empty her mind and her heart into her sister, who was ready, who was waiting, who wanted nothing more to help. 

Instead she swallows the lump in her throat and continues to climb up the stairs, where she takes the right, and enters the bathroom and begins to run the bath. She only beginnings to cry when she's sure the rushing water will drown her out. 

Who was she now? Tramping around the forrest at all hours? Who had she become? Letting some awful, excommunicate distract her from her devotions? Last night in church, all she could do was stare at the back of Mary’s head and pray she hadn’t left a sodden mess in her seat after she rose. She could practically hear her mother’s voice reading her thoughts back to her, asking ‘What was this disgusting behaviour?’. How did she ever expect to get a respectable (and that was always the key word, respectable) husband if she continued down this path of degeneration?

No, she wasn't happy. She would never be happy, no matter what new age nonsense Hilda spouted. She had aged out of happiness. Those who saw the world, truly saw it, and not just saw it, but who lived in it and lived in it, they could never be happy, knowing it was an illusion, a lie. She knew she had no right to ask Satan for happiness after Levi. It's why what spark of joy she felt towards or for Ambrose, or Sabrina, and yes, even Hilda had to be buried, had to be hidden. 

She couldn't risk them. 

Wouldn't. 

Happiness, she turns the word over and over in her mind as she eases her sore and scuffed body into the oil anointed hot water and takes a deep breathe in. Happiness, can you imagine?  


* * *

  
The halls of Greendale High feel different and Lilith is immediately on edge. 

She walks down the hallway slowly, deliberately, trying to put her finger on what it is exactly. 

Warmer, she tells herself, following it. Warmer. It's familiar, but that doesn't narrow it down much. Warmer. She follows it down the hall, past the trophy case, and into the main office. Much warmer.

She enters the outer office and her body tingles with magic. She greets the school secretary and lies about a productive morning with the Superintendent before she enters her office.

Hot.

A quick scan reveals everything is where it should be, how it should be. No visible traps, or unwelcome, unwanted guests.

And that's when she sees it, on her desk. Nature may abhor a vacuum but Lilith abhors a mess, so the page left on it gets her hackles up. She approaches it cautiously, not certain this isn't another visit from Maury, or countless other demons smelling her blood in the water. 

She drags it across the desk, the tattered edges show it's been ripped out of one of her books - thankfully from a mortal text - but the message is lost on her. She picks it up to get a closer look, and that's when it hit her.

Or, more correctly, washes over her.

It's Zelda's magic. The whole room is vibrating with it. Everything is shaking slightly, softly, long after her departure. The page means nothing - a passage from Milton's Paradise Lost:   
_As I bent down to look, just opposite_  
A shape within the watery gleam appeared,  
Bending to look on me: I started back,  
It started back; but pleased I soon returned,  
Pleased it returned as soon with answering looks  
Of sympathy and love: There I had fixed  
Mine eyes till now, and pined with vain desire...

But the message was not lost on her - she was here. Lilith walks around the room, trailing a finger along the edge of the desk, the spines of the books, all having a faint trace of her. She takes the defaced volume of Milton and opens it to the missing page and imagines for a moment the vision of barefooted Zelda, making her way down the halls and corridors. Her hair matted and tangled, knees red, garters and undergarments shoved in a pocket. She imagines Zelda making her way into her locked office the same way she made her way into her locked cabin. She imagines Zelda touching everything like she had just done. She imagines Zelda looking at each and every book, pouring over them. She imagines her slotting her fingers into different sections of the book to keep her spots as she flips between them until she finds just the right level of insignificant significance. 

And then she imagines her grinning as her fingers contract the page until it rips from its spine.

She doesn't know why, but the whole things sends a shiver down her back and she's tempted to ask Zelda to come back to the office, to remind her what else that hand is good for.

She runs a finger along the ragged remains of the page and the ache in her chest twinges again. 

Satan, she hopes this body isn't failing her, she's gotten rather attached to it.  


* * *

  
Meanwhile, across town, Faustus smooths over his hair, adjusts his blouse and his jewellery. Why did he pick this ring, today of all days - it was loose and would bother him the entire time. No, better to take it off, he thinks to himself, slipping it into his pocket and feeling marginally better. It's just as he takes a breath does the ground beneath his feet and the walls behind his back begin to tremble with the almighty power of the Dark Lord himself.

The Dark Lord has requested an audience with him. If he wasn't working so hard to maintain his composure, he'd laugh with glee, fuck Edward Spellman, and fuck every last person who made fun of him. 

Where were they now? 

Dead, or unimportant, that's where.

He takes another deep breath and tries to keep down his breakfast - the sulphuric stench of flesh rot, brimstone and suffering becoming stronger with every tremble of the ground and he fights every urge to gag. Instead, he chooses to focus on the heavy steps. When he's sure Satan himself is in his room, he turns to greet him. 

He isn't what he expected, a bull's head rather than a goat's above a well tailored suit covering a human body. Before he can bow, or say anything, the demon before him speaks. “Calm yourself, for I am a Herald for the Dark Lord." Two lesser demons scamper up on fours to their master, but he leaves them un-introduced - Faustus can't help but stare at them, as if dogs and men had created an unholy abomination. "Please, have a seat." A hand motions towards the seats, where Faustus is guided, a guest in his own office. The two demons hurry over to him and lay their hand/paw, mangled into a claw, upon his wrists. They're stronger than he first thought, and suddenly his heart begins to race. "Comfortable?" The bull-headed demon asks.   
"Quite."  
"Good." He nods, and the demons at Faustus' sides tighten their grip and rotate his chair until his back is facing the Herald, the passageway to Hell. He struggles to look behind him, but the harder he tries to twist, the deeper the claws hold onto him, and eventually he gives in. The Herald says nothing, and Faustus gets the direct impression that he doesn't care for him. The room is nearly silent other than the crackle of the fire to ward off the dewy morning chill. Faustus swears he hears the demon cough. 

And then there's the rumble of the ground shaking once more. 

His heart begins to swell as his hears begin to hear the sound of cloven hooves on stone and he shifts in his seat, his pants growing snug. It's getting closer, and the closer it gets, the more he feels the Satanic spirit wash over him - every cell in his body is vibrating, is humming. Is alive. He has given everything, everything for this moment and now it's here. 

It’s finally here.

The footfalls stop and even though Faustus can't see him, he knows he's in the room. "Your Dark Highness." He stutters out, "An honour."  
"It is." A voice confirms - deep and primal. "I hope you're not too uncomfortable?"  
"Not in the least." Faustus lies. Is honoured to lie in the presence of the Dark Lord himself.   
"Blackwood - you've dedicated your life to me, yes?"  
"Absolutely."  
"And you'd do whatever was necessary, wouldn't you?"  
"Anything for you, my Lord. Anything."  
"Good. Good." There's the sound of hooves pacing on the stone floors, "There are not many I would think I could come to with my request. I hope you will not disappoint me."  
"I would rather die."  
"You might yet," Satan warns. Faustus' eyes move to the glass covered folio texts on the wall, in which he can see the horns, the fur, the shape, of his divine deity, but noting more. 

The glass shatters, and his view of Satan is gone. 

"When you are worthy of seeing me, you will see me."  
"I'm sorry, Dark Lord." Faustus begins to apologise. "I should've never - I just so badly-"  
"I know Faustus, I know. And if it be my will, you will see me, soon. And you will be rewarded beyond even that. But first, I need to know if I can rely on you. Can I rely on you, Faustus Blackwood?"  
"Anything you need, my Lord. Anything for the chance to serve you. To prove myself. To see you and be seen by you."

A moment, then:

"I need you to seduce Zelda Spellman."  
"Seduce...?"  
"Zelda Spellman."

He thinks about it for a moment. It wasn't a particular hardship, he'd ministered to her and slept with her before. Before he can catch himself, he can hear himself ask "But why?". The air in the room changes, and even the creatures at his side shrink themselves slightly. He has done it, ruined his one chance at serving the Dark Lord - he could die right here. He should die. Satan has seen him fit to speak to, to be tested, and he has failed. "I'm sorry, Dark Lord, I should've never - I -"  
"You will never again question me, will you Blackwood?" Satan asks, his voice low, unnaturally calm.  
"No. Never."  
"Most men never get the chance, Faustus, to correct that mistake, do you understand?"

Faustus merely nods, not trusting himself. 

"Seduce Zelda Spellman. Do that and all things can and will be yours. Understand?” Faustus nods again, and this time feels a heavy hand on his shoulder. It's not the Herald's. "I asked you a question, Blackwood. Understand?"  
"Yes, Dark Lord."  
"Repeat what I said." The hand tightens its grip.  
"Seduce Zelda Spellman and all things can and will be mine."  
"Good. It's an easy enough task, don't you think?"  
"Yes, Dark Lord."  
"Besides, it'll do you good to have a woman's touch around here. It's looking a little…bleak.” 

With that, the blood rushes back into Faustus' shoulder as Satan removes his vice-like grip. There's the distinct sound of hooves on stone retreating - the air slowly returns to normal, the demons at his side release him and scamper back - the walls have returned to their previous position.  


* * *

  
"Zelda Spellman, Sir?"  
“You’re not you questioning me, Morax?"  
"Absolutely not. It’s just not like you to share. She’s rather tolerable for a human though, isn’t she?”  
“Sharing? Is that what this is about?” Satan asks, pausing his steps, “I thought it was something serious. Don’t worry, you’ll have your turn.”  
“You’re too kind,” Morax responds, his droll tone not bothering to hide his disinterest. “Shall we continue? I’d love to get back before night.” And so Master and Morax continue to walk through the passages back to Hell, their rightful home in companionable silence before Satan asks casually, too casually, “Plans with Lilith, Morax?"  
"Lilith? No, not since she was sent...well, here, wasn't it?”  
“How did you know it was here?”  
“Loose lips sink ships.”

Satan doesn’t acknowledge the artfully dodged question, he just stays quiet for a moment before he begins once more,   
"I wasn’t sure why you wanted to rush back.  
“Just a card game, and you know she cheats.”  
“It’s Hell, Morax, we all cheat.”  
“Well,” Maury rolls his massive bull eyes, “that explains why I keep losing to you.”  


* * *

  
Faustus is left alone once more with nothing but shattered glass, and a tear on the shoulder of his robe to prove this happened - that Satan recruited him to seduce Zelda Spellman.

He had always known they were destined to be together, even when they were in school and she had hardly paid him any attention. Even when she had disappeared, and he was forced by his parents and propriety to marry Constance (lovely as she was). There was always something between them - destiny, divinity, desire - and now their relationship has been blessed and demanded by no less than the Dark Lord himself. 

Zelda would be his, finally and rightfully, as she should've been all along.  


* * *

  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **AN1:** One of my favourite parts of ‘Angels in America’ (which is, in fact, one of my favourite works of capital A Art) is when the Angel approaches Prior, and Prior (who previously was unable to ‘perform’) gets erect in the presence of such a Supreme Being. It’s a great trick of showing us (not telling us) the awe-some power of divinity. I have stolen it (badly) and feel no shame.
> 
> **AN2:** So here’s the thing, I _really_ hate Faustus as a character, but I really _love_ Richard Coyle and his portrayal of Faustus. So I’m really stretching myself by not making Faustus pure evil and really trying to flesh him out. Which means more Faustus, and more efforts at trying to not paint him as a shitty, shitty person… But with every addition he just gets shittier and I’m so sorry but he’s such a perfect cartoon villain! ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯
> 
> **AN3:** I’m gonna be honest… The last chapter was super hard to write, I worked on it for ages and ages until I didn’t hate it (which, tbh, is about as good as it gets with me), and it got near-zero response and I’m curious why. This _honestly & sincerely_ isn’t a ploy for more feedback or pity, or sympathy, or praise. I just…don’t understand (and tbh, I don’t understand a fair bit about most things) and would love to course correct (a massive benefit of fan writing as opposed to my irl writing). If you have any insight and feel comfortable about it, I’d love to hear about what didn’t connect with you, dear reader…


	5. And Then It Gets Much Worse

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “She is in me, Faustus, and I cannot bleed her out.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **AN1:** Trigger Warning: Religion, semi-consensual whipping, coercion. Upon editing it, I also realise the argument Faustus uses mirrors thinly veiled homophobia…

  


* * *

  
“Bless me Father, for I have sinned.”  
“Tell me of your sins, and don’t forget to include every last detail.” The voice in the dark commands.  
“Father Blackwood,” Zelda admonishes, only partly serious.  
“Sister Spellman,” He teases back, shifting to see her better through the grille that separates their two booths in the confessional. “You know you don’t have to confess Zelda, this is more for the students, I just like for them to see the staff participate, a good example, you know.”  
“I know - Percival Nightshade told me he the other day that spends his time in here reading you his play.”  
“He’s an abysmal writer.”  
“Oh, absolutely.” She agrees before pausing, “Though I do have something to confess though, if I may?”  
“I’d be disappointed if you didn’t have anything.” He revels in his good fortune and wonders if Satan himself has lead her to him, or if it’s merely a coincidence. “Tell me of your sins, Sister Spellman.”  
“I have…” She sighs and uncrosses and crosses her legs.  
“Zelda? Is this about who I am, and what I am? To you?” He schools his face into a serious expression, “Because I assure you that this confessional is sacred, sanctified. I’m merely a conduit for and of the Dark Lord, and we only want to help you, Zelda. We only want to make sure you say on the right path, the Path of Night. Do you believe me?”  
“Yes,” Zelda answers, only partially lying. “I do. Which is what makes this so hard.”  
“Take your time.”

A moment passes, and then another. And then she speaks:

“I feel my devotion slipping.”  
“Zelda?”  
“And I can’t stop it,” With the words out, they keep coming and coming and coming, “I still pray both upon rising and resting, but my mind _wanders_.”  
“Wanders?”  
“Wanders. I’ll be reading my Satanic Verses and I find myself unable to recall them - me, who has them memorised in 17 different languages. Even during your services, my thoughts just scatter - it’s not your sermons, no, those are wonderful - these are just…thoughts that distract me away from my devotion.” She takes a breath, “My devotion is all I have.”  
“It’s not all you have, Zelda.”  
“It is all I have to offer the Dark Lord - and he’s given me so much, and now I can’t even repay him with something as simple as my prayers.”  
“Devotion isn’t about repayment Zelda - it’s an honest expression of gratitude.”  
“And I am grateful, Father Blackwood. I am so incredibly grateful. But -”  
“Where does your mind wander Zelda? When you’re meant to be praying?”  
“Oh,” She stalls, “Here and there. History, theology.”  
“Theology? You aren’t - you aren’t thinking of straying from the Path of Night, are you? Zelda, the Spellman fa-”  
“No, no, nothing like that. Absolutely not.” There is certainty in her voice, and it reassures Faustus on some level. Perhaps this is why Satan entrusted him with his task, to bring the Spellmans back into the fold. Not Hilda, no, that simple fool was a lost cause from the moment she was sent off to England, but Zelda, and through Zelda, perhaps Sabrina. He would be like a shepherd, tending to and securing his flock. Faustus is so lost in his self-aggrandising thoughts, he doesn’t hear the rest of her confession. It’s not until she stops talking that he returns to the task at hand. “Zelda - you know I care about you, not just as shepherd cares for his flock, but as a friend, as practically family, you were there for Constance in our darkest days. You’re Judas’ Night Mother after all - please, let me help you.”  
“How Faustus? I have tried everything but I can’t seem to find my way back to the Dark Father.”  
“That’s just it. You’ve tried everything you can alone. You don’t **always** have to be alone.” He lowers his voice, mimicking compassion. "Let me help, let me help with your penance and let me help guide you back.”  
“I couldn’t ask that of you Faustus.”  
“You’re not asking, I’m offering. I will not let you wander lost in the Valley. I will bring you back. All things are possible in Satan’s loving guidance. Do you believe that? Do you believe me?”  
“I do.”  
“Good. We begin tonight then. Your place or mine?”

In the dark of the confessional booth, Zelda cannot see him grinning ear to ear.  


* * *

  
__

_And both of these things - female delight and female desire - are so often demonised - Pamela Grossman_

  


* * *

  
Zelda knocks at the High Priest’s door precisely at nine, as requested. And as requested, she shuts the door behind her, locking it loudly. Where once the sound gave her a shiver of anticipation, this time is seems to set her heart racing in another way entirely. As requested, she strips down to her slip, and then beyond that, and as requested, she kneels before the High Priest. She accepts his words as gospel as he reads the Dark Bible over her and she does not correct his outdated interpretation of the text. The words she knows so well, the words that have brought her comfort in times of trouble and unrest in her soul - they seem to wash over her now like the tide at the beach, reaching her but receding almost immediately, the relief fleeting. Even now, with her aching knees - still red and sore from the porch - with the words and deeds of Lucifer filling her ears, she feels her spirit stray. Her mind reaches for memories of Mary, thoughts of Mary - and she could cry with anger and rage. Who was this demon who sought to tempt her away from her Lord? The Lord they should both serve, gladly and whole-heartedly? Why was she haunting her, first in her dreams, and now in her waking hours? Why is this succubus preying on her? Infesting her mind, her spirit? Testing her?  


* * *

  
__

_As happens so often when it comes to arousal, shame and judgement were part of the equation: take a good long look at this very bad thing - Pamela Grossman_

  


* * *

  
She soon begins to recite the words with Faustus, if only to drown out his voice in her ears - so different from Mary’s while she whispered over her broken body and split skin before. Their recitations grow louder, harder - they grow in urgency until they reach a fevered pitch, broken only by the crack of the crop as it lashes in the air and lands against her bare back with a crispness. She doesn’t cry out - no - she stuffs her mouth full of every hateful and impure thought and lets herself choke on them as Faustus continues to pray over her - his words trying to purify her filthy soul and his lashing to purify her wanton body. Satan help her, it isn’t working. With every word, every stroke, all she can see, all she can think of is the demon Mary Wardwell. She can’t help but pray that one day it would be Mary who offers to purify and sanctify her - restore her. She can see it in her mind now - Mary’s face twisted into that odd smile as she cracks the crop down onto her back - and then lovingly heals her back up, her fingers sliding along the skin slit open and commanding them to heal. She would gladly take 100 lashings from Mary and she deserves nothing less - she is a failure at so many things. She has failed and it is her failure that has lead to Satan abandoning her, throwing her into the path of his Hellish succubus and even that is too good a fate for her. Even that is a reward, better than what she deserves. Perhaps it’s - “Zelda?” Faustus asks softly, his hand gently stroking the top of her hair, “Zelda, where did you go?”  
“I…I don’t know,” She lies, lowering her eyes, unable to answer him.  
“You used to enjoy this Zelda,” He nudges her chin up with his hand, forcing her to look at him.  
“I did, I do.”  
“It used to bring you closer to Satan, closer to me.” He continues, his hand gently gliding up and down her throat. Satan alive, how he had pictured her like this before him countless nights when they were in school together… He has to struggle to not tighten his grip around her neck as he recalls the pain and humiliation she had once brought him. And now… Here she is, on her knees before him. “Tell me, where did you go?”  
“Nowhere.” She whispers.  
“Who were you with?” He asks.  
“No one.”  
“Was it her? Was it Mary Wardwell?” He spits out her name like the poison that it is.  
“She is in me, Faustus, and I cannot bleed her out.” She finally admits, “No matter how hard I try.”  
“Tell me about her, Zelda.”  
“What about her?”  
“Tell me every last detail of what she says to you, what she does to you, what you do to her. Tell me everything. Get it out, so it can remain out. Darkness is the bedrock of our religion, but secrets bring painful, awful light. So tell me. Unburden yourself.” 

And so Zelda Spellman confesses every last detail she can recall - and some she didn’t even know she knew: the small patch at the base of Mary’s neck where the hair grew stick straight compared to the curls and waves, the scar on her left hip, the tender timbre to her voice, her sweet tooth and her love of almond cookies, the look on her face when Zelda praised her or showed her a moment of uncharacteristic kindness. She confesses to the shiver that runs through her body when Mary touches her just so. She confesses to smoking less to keep Mary’s taste on her tongue longer. She confesses to blasphemy - of worshiping Mary with the reverence one would worship Lilith with. She confesses and confesses and confesses and it’s never enough and it has moved from annoying her to terrifying her. Mary Wardwell, whatever, whoever she is, has no right to do this to her. To make her feel all sorts of feelings she had long forgot herself capable of feeling. 

Including shame.

Because shame causes her body to blush as Faustus Blackwood pokes and pokes and pokes at her. Asking, always asking. 

“She is everywhere, everything and I-”  
“She isn’t like us, Zelda. She isn’t one of us.”  
“I know,” She agrees in anguish, “And yet I can’t stop.”  
“You must, Zelda. You must stop. It’s the Dark Lord’s will.”  
“What if this is his will?” She offers, desperate for some logic to her suffering, some order that can be brought to this madness.  
“It’s not, Zelda.” He says, not unkindly.  
“What if she-” She has resorted to pleading, still on her knees.  
“She’s not.” He repeats firmly. “I have seen the path the Dark Lord wants for you, Zelda, and it’s not with that Stranger. It’s here, with me.”

Zelda looks up at him, literally, actually. He stands before her and offers her…an answer. A path. Something.

“Zelda,” He begins, his hand still petting her, absent-mindedly, unsure of how to proceed, how much to let on. “The Dark Lord has gifted me…” Yes, he can see the right tact to satisfy both Satan and Zelda. He schools his face in seriousness. “With a vision. You and I, Zelda, we can elevate the Church of Night up out of the dwindled ashes into the fire as is right. Constance, Satan keep her soul, had gifted me a son, but she could never understand the role of High Priestess as you do. You can gift me with a **partner**.” He’s putting every ounce of his soul into his performance, and as he’s convincing her, perhaps he’s even convincing himself. For Constance was as good and reliable as her name would imply, but still, she was not bred for this role as Zelda had been, she wasn’t groomed for it… Hell, he wasn’t even certain Satan knew who he was, but he knew Zelda. 

If Satan knew Zelda, then logic holds that Zelda must have some darkly divine purpose. There was always something about the Spellmans… Everyone knew it. Their powers stronger, the lineage longer, their blood darker. 

Faustus contorts his face into the best approximation of genuine compassion, consideration.

“Zelda - together. Think of it. We simply need to remove her from your life, so that you can move forward as Satan intended.”  
“Her?”  
“I see the way she looks at you, as if you’re meat to her and she is starving. I see you shiver at the thought of being devoured by her. This isn’t you.” His eyes trail over her exposed back, all the marks and bites and bruises that weren’t caused by him, by his leather. “Seeking pleasure is well and good. Our Father gave us these bodies and these wills to explore, to enjoy, to be pleasured and to bring pleasure. But when you come to me, putting words to what we’ve all seen, what we’ve all noticed - you must ask yourself is this what he wants for you? Of you? You, his most devoted servant?” He runs his hands through her hair, pulling his hand back when he reaches the blood soaked ends. 

He pauses for a moment, debating how much harder to push her, but the fear of failure is too great to him, and subtlety has never been something the men of Blackwood’s family have particularly aspired to, and so he presses on. 

“I say this as a friend, a concerned party in your life Sister Spellman -” He commends himself on the change of name, it was a particularly good touch, “But it’s been brought up more than once.”  
“What has?”  
“Your peers have noticed a change.”  
“I -”  
“Concerned peers, I may add. We are charged with guiding the next generation of minds and hearts, Sister Spellman. Ensuring that they remain on the one, true path. But how can you guide them if you have wandered off it? How can you be permitted to teach if you’re uncertain what to teach?”  
“You…you would revoke my position?”  
“Not me, Zelda, but the board. If this behaviour goes unchecked, how can they turn a blind eye?”

He watches, glee hidden, as Zelda processes this subtle threat. He lets the fear settle deep into her bones, her blood. And then…

“Let me help you, Zelda. The Dark Lord doesn’t mean for us to go through life alone. He creates and crafts help-mates, friends, to help guide us. Let me help you as I know you would help me.”  
“How Faustus, when I’m uncertain of how to help myself at this point?”  
“Make yourself available to me. Trust me. Return to the trust you had in the Dark Lord that he will guide you. Has guided you…” He holds out his hand to help her up off her knees, “To me.”

Zelda gazes up at him. He is offering her everything she could want. She does want. Who cares if he’s missing certain things? Things that draw her to Mary, he has others to compensate. He is promising her a future, one her mother groomed her for and called her birthright. 

She takes him in, every last inch. She doesn’t delude herself that he loves her. Faustus loves no one but himself - she is certain of that - but he loves power. He craves it, has craved it since he was a social climbing brat who used to try to best Edward. Still, he’s a known quantity, easy to predict and to manoeuvre. And if his vision was truly from the Dark Lord, perhaps it’s the answer to not just her own prayers, but her family’s… And Letty. 

Letty, who may not be safe any more with Dezmelda, the old crone telling her there were beings sniffing around, getting too close.

What choice does she **_really_** have?

And with a heaviness that takes even her by surprise, she puts her hand in his and asks in her most helpless voice, “Help me Faustus.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **AN2:** The title is from Florence + The Machine’s ‘Big God’… _Sometimes I think it's gettin' better_  
>  And then it gets much worse  
> Is it just part of the process?


	6. Whipped, Heaving

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Still, as Mary rinses her hair she realises the punishment for sins of the body and sins of the soul are the same... If she's going to have to suffer for Mary, she will earn it. Confidant now in her decision, she begins to turn in the tub, and moves towards Mary and with one wet arm, brings their heads together in a dizzying, drowning kiss.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **AN1:** Triggers for mentions of semi-consensual relations (Looking at you Faustus) and more blood (if you could handle the earlier dream chapters, this should be fine). Also some depictions of violence towards animals (again, if you’re ok with the show, it should be fine).

  


* * *

  
_a few weeks later_  
  
  
"But I don't understand." Sabrina exclaims, shutting her textbook in frustration.  
“Noooo, you really don’t.“ Lilith sighs, trying to hide her exasperation, "But you will."  
"It doesn't feel like it."  
"Sabrina, I assure you, every great witch has gone through this feeling."  
"What if Father Blackwood is right? What if I'm not cut out for this?"  
"Oh, not with that again, he used to say the same thing to your father, and look how he turned out.” Hilda chides, dropping off a plate of cookies at the kitchen table where Sabrina is studying under Mary's watchful eye.   
“Dead?” Mary asks, flipping through one of the notebooks before her.  
“High Priest.” Hilda glares as she moves to them with a plate, “Now have a biscuit." She offers before moving back to the island where she works at preparing another batch. “If your father could best Faustus Blackwood, so can you.”  
"How did he do it?"  
"Practice," Hilda sing-songs. "And a little help from your Aunt."  
"Speaking of," Lilith begins, schooling her voice into a false sense of indifference, "Where is she?" She rises and moves to the stove to refill her cup with more tea. Somewhere along the way it seems she developed a taste for it.   
"Oh. I don't know." Hilda pauses, "Usually she's with-" She shoots a glance over and Mary before busying herself with her dough again. "Mother Nature."

Lilith snorts and then coughs, the hot liquid going down the wrong pipe and scalding her. Satan, was Zelda that obvious? Still - she swirls the dark cinnamon coloured liquid around - Zelda's nocturnal visits had certainly slowing down. If she wasn't with her, who was she with?

"I don't know, she mentioned something about Father Blackwood after school -" Sabrina offered, "Something about how he needed to see her."  
"I bet." Hilda muttered under her breath before Mary could.   
"I don't know why she likes him."  
"Likes him?" Lilith asks tittering, her voice going higher... So... Faustus. The thought makes her want to vomit. Bile. All over him. Before she quarters him. Now there was something they should bring back... Perhaps she will.  
"Oh love, I doubt she likes him. Respects him maybe," Hilda offers, trying not to roll her eyes at Mary's direction. Satan save her from these two.   
"If you say so, but he's definitely feeling more than respect towards her. All those 'private' sessions..."  
"Sabrina!" Hilda exclaims as she wordlessly takes Mary's tea cup from her vice-like grip. She moves towards the cabinet where she pulls out her cooking whiskey and pours it straight into the tea cup and hands it back to Mary. "That's your aunt!”  
"And that's Father Blackwood and he's..."  
"Distracting us from the matter at hand, which is your mid-terms. So, back to the books Miss."  
"Right! You're right! I should be focused on mid-terms, and not the fact that _both_ my centuries old aunts have a better dating life than I do." She pauses before snatching a cookie and snapping it in two, "Satan, that's depressing."  
"Both?" Lilith asks, sitting herself back down. "Both?"  
"Well Doctor C seems _very_ smitten with Aunt Hilllda…”  
"Sabrina," Hilda warns. A little teasing here or there was fine, but Vesta Spellman had instilled a strong sense of propriety and privacy in her children, particularly her daughters. A shiver goes down her spine at the thought of those lessons.  
"And what about Zelda...?" Mary asks, playing with a pen.   
"Oh, out 'walking the woods’ with Father Blackwood like we're in Wuthering Heights."  
"Excellent reference." Mary offers, taking a sip from her cup. She wonders if she should mention to Zelda that her wanderings were less than subtle.   
"I thought you'd like it." Sabrina grins, thankful in some small way for the link between her two lives exists. "At least she was. Now she's locked back in to devotional studies ‘the likes of which you’ll never understand Sabrina,’” She continues, mimicking Zelda's tone, "Or in 'private study' with him. Anyways, I really appreciate you helping me with this Ms. Wardwell." Sabrina said, opening another textbook.  
"Not at all dear. Always happy to help prove Faustus wrong." She grits out. So Zelda's taken up devotion with Faustus. An interesting way to phrase it. "Are you sure you don't want to return back to Magical and Natural Laws."  
“I think if I read one more law about my inferior status as a half-breed witch, I'll renounce!" She jokes. "I have a Brewing mid-term coming up, but Aunt Hilda said she'd help me tomorrow. So up next is Texts and Translations."  
"It does seem to be much more your Aunt Zelda's strengths than mine."  
"I know, but she's been...busy." She rolls her eyes. "So it looks like it's you and me."  
"Sabrina," Hilda begins, working her dough and watching her words, "Your aunt has given everything...for this family, you know, we both have. It's time now for her to h-"  
"I know Aunt Hilda, I do. And I'm so happy for you both... (Even if Aunt Zelda doesn’t seem happy herself), but does it have to be Faustus Blackman? Seriously, that man is just..." She shudders, "Vile. And mean, and cruel, and sexist and..."  
"Despicable?" Mary offers, her face the model of innocence.   
"YES! Thank you."  
"Hush, the _both_ of you." Hilda points to them. "Now, are you going to gossip, or are you going to study?”  
"Study Aunt Hilda." Sabrina sighs, opening her notes.  
"Oh, I was going to go with gossip, but we can study too." Lilith shrugs, "Now, how far have you gotten?"  


* * *

  
She can smell him. She sniffs the air, and she can smell Faustus Blackwood. The smell of frankincense, fear, and pomade. "Again." She instructs Sabrina, forcing her face in a neutral position, her eyes on the text Sabrina's spent the last 90 minutes verbally translating. "You're getting the point of it all, but you're lacking the poetry." She speaks as if she doesn't hear the door open, she doesn't feel the familiar air of Zelda's own power. "The true power of incantation is the belief you put into them, how do these words make you feel? Again."  
"Again?" Sabrina rolls her head back.  
"Again."  
"Again." Sabrina begrudgingly agrees. "Hi Aunt Zee." She greets, not raising her eyes from her notes.  
"Oh, Zelda, welcome home." Hilda welcomes from the oven. "I saved you some dinner."  
"I'm not hungry." She responds from the doorway. "What's all this?"  
"Texts and Translations mid-term."  
"I said I'd help you."  
"I know." Sabrina takes another cookie and dunks it into her tea, "But you've been so...busy lately I didn't want to bother you. So I asked Ms. Wardwell."  
"I see - well, lucky us." Zelda looks about the kitchen, anywhere but where she wanted to. "It's never a bother, Sabrina, but since you've already started, I won't interrupt from your studies. Good night all." She turns and gingerly makes her way up the stairs.   
"Is she upset I asked-"  
"No love, she's just tired." Hilda offers, preparing a cup of tea before toping it off with a healthy dose of whiskey. "That said, it's late and you should get some sleep."  
"Aunt Hilda-"  
"No 'Aunt Hilda's', you're a growing witch, and you're still part mortal, so you do _occasionally_ need sleep. Now, Mary, can you take this up to Zelda, and Sabrina, we'll clear these books off, alright?"   
"Oh, I don't-" Lilith begins, unsure of what to do. The idea of seeing Zelda right now upsets her. She smells of him. He hangs around her like another skin. Another aura. "Up up!" Hilda commands forcefully, cheerfully, as she presses the cup and the saucer with two cookies into to Mary's hands and guides her to the hallway, "I'm sure you can find it. Upstairs to the left." She says loudly before dropping her voice slightly, "A nip of whiskey and some lavender for nerves, biscuits for the sugar."  
"But-"  
"Don't spill it now." Hilda dismisses her firmly, not taking a counter response.

Which is how Lilith finds herself taking the steps carefully, watching the dark liquid slosh about in the cup but never quite tipping over the edge. She's just as careful in the hallway, reflecting how long it had been since she had been here, either in reality, or in dreams. 

She had tried to reach Zelda's dreams after the first week or two, but there was nothing but a door, locked and bolted. 

Reaching the door, she rolls her eyes at her own pathetic, absurd behaviour - nervous of a witch - and then knocks using the tip of her shoe. 

No response, so she presses an ear to the door - running water. She _knock knock knocks_ again, and this time the door opens slightly. She snakes her way in, before closing the door behind her, again with her foot, both hands holding the saucer as a vestal virgin holds forth an offering. 

She sniffs, blood in the air.

Her eyes adjust to the near-dark, Zelda's half-way to the bathroom, a trail of clothes on the floor behind her. The back of her slip tattered, covered in blood, which is not surprising considering the lashes that criss-cross her delicate skin. Zelda disappears into the bathroom. 

Mary considers for a moment killing Faustus and Zelda both, but something seems wrong, something seems off, so she tightens her grip on the saucer until her knuckles go white enough to be seen in the dark. "Hilda asked me to bring you tea." She finally speaks.  
"Satan!" Zelda leans out from the doorway. "Mary, you scared me."  
"Sorry, Hilda sent me with tea." She offers again, closing the distance between them.  
"How kind. You can leave it on the nightstand, thank you." She goes to close the door to the en suite, but once again, Mary moves a leg to block it. "She said to make sure you drink it. Whiskey and lavender for nerves." Lilith lies, as she leans against the doorframe, "And I admit, she scares me a little, so I’ll stay here and make sure you comply.”  
"Hilda?" Zelda snorts, taking the offered tea.  
"Yes."  
"Well," Zelda takes a long sip, silently thankful for the restorative brew, "You've seen me drink it and it's rather late, so good night."  
"No, Zelda."  
"No?" Zelda scoffs. "What do you mean 'no'?"  
"Not until you tell me what's going on.” Lilith shrugs.   
"I had work. I know you surround yourself with mortals, but surely you can understand work?”  
"Can't I miss you?" Lilith drawls, sarcasm dripping from her voice.   
"You're overflowing with the milk of human kindness tonight, aren't you?"  
"Yes, it appears I am." Her hands now empty and her self unfamiliar with what's happening in this room, she's unsure what to do, so she steps further into the washroom and begins to putter around, testing the water before rifling through the cabinet for oils to mix in.   
"You don't need to." Zelda finally speaks.  
"I know." Lilith admits.  
"It's actually scaring me more than anything else tonight."  
"So something scared you tonight?" Lilith asks, her voice shaking under the strain of staying calm.  
"No."  
"Alright." She turns off the taps and adds a final few drops of oil to the bath before she whispers a few words. Together, both women watch the untouched water mix before their eyes. "Mind if I dim the lights?" Lilith asks, before she goes about and lights the candles on the windowsill with her breath.  
"Nice parlour trick." Zelda shoots off.  
"It comes in handy," Lilith smiles over her shoulder. She busies herself with Satan knows what as she hears the soft landing of the slip on the tile, of the slosh of Zelda entering the bath. There is no hiss when the water water hits open wound.   
"You can turn around now."  
"I wanted to give you some privacy," Lilith admits, offering the tea cup back to her.  
"How novel, after I asked you to go."  
"I will. You should try the cookie. They’re rather good."  
"They always are," Zelda admits, but ignores it. She does however take the cup and wraps both her hands around it, taking another deep sip, her eyes dead ahead. 

She cannot give in. She has worked too hard. Besides, Faustus was right, Satan loved her, and Satan wanted what was best for her, and that was not Mary Wardwell.

How she wanted it to be Mary though. She can think that now, now that it could never be.

"How are your devotional duties going?" Mary asks, rifling through the make up and the debris in Zelda's medicine cabinet. She opens a tube of lipstick and swipes it on the inside of her wrist - it's not a good shade for her - she tries another one.   
"Fine."  
"I smelt the blood downstairs. We've picked that back up, I see?"  
"I've been lacking."  
"Says who?" She closes the cabinet door and applies Zelda's lipstick, while making eye contact in the mirror. "Faustus? That two-bit revival tent preacher?"  
"Don't." Zelda's voice takes on a brittle tone and Mary readjusts her tactic. Of course, never do a direct attack. "Did you notice I didn't spill a drop of the tea?" She asks, turning around and smiling at Zelda. She looks so...different in the bath, the water pink with blood. 

That smell.

Her stomach growls and her hackles raise, but still she smiles so hard her cheeks hurt.

"Hilda enchanted it. It's a spell we came up with when we were younger."  
"You can't let me have this?"  
"Absolutely not." Zelda purses her lips, and something small settles between them at this return to their earlier closeness.   
"Are you or are you not going to eat this cookie? Because if you aren't, I will." Lilith holds out the cookie like a peace offering between them, a covenant that for tonight, she will do her best to be kind, to understand.  
"Fine," Zelda sighs, "Give it here."  
"You're only doing it so I can't have it, aren't you?"  
"Not everything is about you Mary." Zelda takes the cookie and snaps it in half before eating it.  
"Of course it is."

The ice, if not broken, then at least cracked, between them, leads Lilith to drag the small stool from the vanity to end of the tub where she settles herself. "Lean back," She murmurs, "You've blood in your hair."  
"Oh."

Zelda does as she's told and leans her head all the way back. She can't help the sigh that escapes as Mary's fingers start work their way through her wet strands. "Up." There's the scent of shampoo, the slightly rough rubbing of the bottom of her strands together, trying to get the brown stains out. She knows that she'll likely have to glamour them out in the morning, treat them the same as she does her roots. She shivers slightly as Mary once again dips her head back into the bath. Maybe it's the water in her ears, but she swears she hears a soft spell before the water warms back up. "Better?" Mary asks, as she raises her head again.   
"Much."  
"Good." Again, the process begins, this time with conditioner. 

Lilith finds the task moderately meditative, if not awkward. Her own tenderness is strange to her - a hard stone in her belly where hunger and want used to live.

Still live.

How could they not still live there?

She runs her fingers through the conditioner soaked hair, ensuring she's gotten the stains out, before pinning it up. Human hair was so fragile. It required so much work and glamour could only do so much. With her hair up, there was nothing to hide Zelda's back from view. It's uglier this time around, knowing who did it. 

Knowing how. 

Knowing it wasn't a dream.

Still, her shaking hand hovers over the red marks and the ache in her chest returns. Over her right scapula - she looks for the soft mouth shaped mark she had left but it's gone... Of course it is. It's been weeks. She wants to blame Zelda, but finds the act empty, hollow. How many times has she allowed Satan to hurt her in hopes he'd love her? She knows she's a pastime for the witch, but to see her debase herself for a man who doesn't deserve her? Who doesn't deserve any being, judging by his actions? It's her pride that hurts.

Yes.

That's what she repeats in her mind. It's her pride, and nothing else. To lose a woman like Zelda Spellman to a man like Faustus Blackwood - of course she'd be wounded. 

"Here." Zelda leans forward and wraps her arms around her knees, offering up more of her back. "Would you...do you mind?"  
"Wouldn't Faustus be upset? Seeing his handiwork disappear?"  
"You know, we never spoke about being exclusive. I didn't take you as the jealous type."  
"Oh, I'm so sorry, let me introduce myself to you, Mary Wardwell. I don't play well with others and I don't share my toys."  
"You play well with me."  
"But I won't share you." Her fingers toy with the edges of skin. There's something different about them since the last time she's had to patch Zelda up like this. "You aren't **sharing** me, I'm not something to be shared."  
"Quiet please, I need to focus. He's certainly done a number on you." She runs her fingers over welts and over once more. There's something... A hunger, but not lust. Not for sex anyways. "Did you want it?"  
"What?" A pause, "Want is meaningless. It was needed. Purification was needed. Proof."  
"Proof?"  
"Of devotion to the Dark Lo-ssssss!" She leaps forward, her words becoming a hiss, water sloshing out of the tub at the sudden motion of Mary's fingers digging into an open wound.  
"Satan! I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. My hand slipped. It slipped." She repeats herself, angry at herself for hurting Zelda, livid at the thought of Faustus's fraud, mind racing through the details of how she would disembowel him. 

There was a part of Zelda that knew, deep down, that she deserved this. Not Mary tending to her wounds, no, she doesn't deserve that kindness, not from her own personal demon. But she knew, when she first met with Faustus that something like this would happen, had to happen. 

"And just why does the Dark Lord need you purified?"  
"I've been called."  
"By the Dark Lord?"  
"By Faustus...who has been called by the Dark Lord."  
"I see."  
"You think I'm foolish."  
"Did he threaten you?"   
"No. He didn't threaten me, he didn't...violate me.""  
"Zelda."  
"Mary. Are you going to heal my back or not? I'm starting to prude in this water."  
"At your age, you prune out of the water too.” She teases. "Lean forward." Lilith forces herself to focus. It takes everything she has to not think of using Faustus' own whip against him until he's split open and Maury's dogs are feasting upon his organs. Satan, the thought alone makes her salivate. No, she is not thinking of that now, she's thinking about knitting together the cells that make Zelda's veins and muscles and skin whole once more.   
"He didn't threaten me." Zelda repeats again, softer this time, "He threatened my job, and there's a difference."  
"I see." (She doesn't. She doesn't see anything beyond Zelda's skin healing, the red-brown lashes turning pink, turning soft, turning into unblemished skin). "You're all done." Perfect, she wants to say, but this entire exchange is too cloying, too confusing. She wants to hang Faustus, she wants justice and retribution not just for Zelda, but for Satan knows how many others. She wants to leave Zelda to her own devices. She wants to have never heard of the Satan-forsaken town. "Mary?" Zelda asks finally.  
"Yes?"  
"What was Edward like?"  
"He was your brother, you knew him better than almost anyone."  
"I mean...to others. To you?"  
"To me?" Ah yes, her supposed unrequited love. Did she even need to perpetuate that lie? She supposes she must. "He was a good man, Zelda. Much better than Faustus... Before, long before, you asked why I don't like Faustus. Edward would never..."  
"Faustus is just different. And Edward, was killed. Obviously, it was Satan's will Faustus rule, wasn't it?"  
"Who can say what Satan's will is? I can’t." It guts her that that was true. "But Edward was a kind man, a just man. Edward never took-" She pauses, catching herself, "What was not willingly offered. What was offered joyfully."  
"And was it offered joyfully?"  
"He was a good man," She deflects.   
"And me?"  
"And you?"  
"Am I good woman?" Zelda is thankful that they're having this conversation without looking at each other. She couldn't stand to see Mary's face while talking about Edward. She didn't know what she would see, she just knew she didn't want to see it. Even still, there are questions she can't ask, can't even think. She had spent the whole of her life in the glow of her younger brother’s glory, and even in his death it continues to shine over her. "Yes." Lilith admits, her voice lowered, almost ashamed. "You are a good woman, Zelda." She wants to continue, but the words choke her. Instead, she swallows. "Lean back, let's finish your hair."

And so, Zelda leans back, but she doesn't close her eyes until she absolutely has to. No, she locks eyes with Mary and she doesn't break it. She tries to say everything she can't. She tries to say nothing. She'll have to confess this to Faustus. She'll have to confess and be purified, be punished once more, until she's fit to be his companion. To be married in the eyes of Satan. To do what she has thus far been unable to do for her family. 

Still, as Mary rinses her hair she realises the punishment for sins of the body and sins of the soul are the same... If she's going to have to suffer for Mary, she will earn it. Confidant now in her decision, she begins to turn in the tub, and moves towards Mary and with one wet arm, brings their heads together in a dizzying, drowning kiss. They pass between them one breath, one heartbeat, one want - the other. They continue until they cannot anymore, until their lungs give out and the water, enchanted as it may be, turns cold. Sucking in lungfuls of eucalyptus scented air, they pant and breathe - still clutching each other's hair. Still wanting. "Run away with me?" Lilith asks, the corner of her mouth tugged upwards.   
"Why not?" Zelda agrees, "But first, I need a minute or two to finish up here." A moment. "Alone."  
"Yes, alone." She leans over and offers another kiss, firm and brief.   
"Will you wait?"  
"Oh," She wanted her to stay, "Yes." She shrugs, "If you'd like."  
"Good." Zelda nods, the consequences of what she had just done hitting her once more.

So Lilith rises, either unaware or uncaring that she's half-drenched and goes to leave the bathroom when she stops and turns around for a moment. It's in that moment, as she takes in the sight of Zelda in the tub, small and unarmed - her feral nature beaten down, but not beaten out she knows. 

Lilith knows she will regret Zelda Spellman like she has regretted nothing else in her life.

And with that, she closes the door to the bathroom to give the other woman some privacy.  


* * *

  
She finds herself in the dark, but she can sense she’s not alone… Still, she acts as if she is, feeling her way around to the window where she opens the curtains (the same curtains Zelda once gazed down at her from) and lets in the bright light from the half moon. When she turns to face the room, she finds the intruder in the form of Salem, Sabrina’s familiar sitting upright on the bed, watching her. She growls at him, but he doesn’t move, doesn’t flinch. She’s half impressed and half infuriated at the level of disrespect being shown to her. 

She stares at him and he stares right back.

He can’t recall the dream, could he?

No, she thinks, moving restlessly about the room until Zelda calls out to her: “Mary, could you pull out a night gown for me? The second drawer from the top.”  
“Oh, uh, yes.” She stammers, suddenly deeply, deeply uncomfortable with the task of dressing Zelda when she much prefers stripping her. Still, she sets out on the task at hand, opening the drawer and plunging her hands into the mound of silk and lace and satin. She begins to root through them, holding up the odd piece to see it in the moonlight before she stumbles on just the right one and pulls it out. “Are you sure that’s the one you want?” Zelda teases from the doorway to the bathroom where she stands, wrapped in her robe, amused at the care and effort the demon before her put towards her selection. “Fairly sure, yes.” Lilith responds, handing it to her, “What do you think Salem?” She asks, but finds the cat has abandoned her, leaving just the two of them once more. “I swear, he was here.” She explains, but the look on Zelda’s own face makes it clear she doesn’t believe her. “Do you mind closing the door?” Zelda asks, and Lilith complies, confused by the softness that exists between them this evening. This is different than before, this softness wasn’t a ploy or a plot. 

No, this was painful. 

This hurts her. 

It hurt Lilith to be here, to be gentle and tender, to contort her voice into something approximating a soothing tone. She wanted nothing more than to claim Zelda as her own once more, to scent her as her own again so that Faustus and everyone else who even looked at her, approached her, would know she was spoken for, she was under Lilith’s own guard and protection. She wants to run with the wolves once more and never see this woman ever again. 

When she turns back around, she sees Zelda in the slip she had picked out and the already powerful sense of protection she feels surges to something she didn’t know she could still feel and it terrifies her. “You apparently have a thing for these,” Zelda comments, noting her companion’s eyes growing larger, even in the dark, at the sight of her in her slip.   
“I don’t know.” She shrugs from where she stands at the door to the room, “They suit you, I suppose.”  
“Such praise.”  
“You don’t need me to praise you.” She counters  
“Don’t I?”  
“You know what you do to me,”  
“Do I?” Zelda shrugs as she pulls back the bedspread and readies herself for bed.  
“I don’t have the words,” She admits, making her way behind Zelda and stopping short, her eyes focusing on muscles beneath the skin and the silk, “To tell you what they do to me…” Her hand goes up to the thin strap and she takes it in two fingers, and she pretends she doesn’t see Zelda freeze, her muscles coil with fear, “How they hide everything,” She drops her hand and steps back, “And nothing. Soft.” She says, but doesn’t clarify if she’s speaking about the garment or the woman. Sensing she’s too close for either of their comfort, she moves towards the other side of the bed and helps pull back the covers. The domesticity of the situation is revolting, but she cannot get the image of Zelda tensing up before her out of her mind. Satan knows what nonsense Faustus filled her head with, but she still doesn’t feel good leaving when there’s still some part of Zelda which is calling out to her. 

“I suppose I should go?” She finally stammers, while she rolls her eyes at her own clumsiness. Why was this so difficult? Why was this so hard? Zelda keeps watching her as if she wants to ask her - “What tipped you off?” Zelda drawls, sliding in between the sheets, “Was it when I asked you to leave? Or now that I’m in bed?”  
“Oh, I don’t know. Can’t quite put my finger on it, but I’m rather astute about these things.”  
“Yes, I can see.” Zelda agrees, mocking her. With a final nod, Lilith turns to leave the room, almost out when Zelda continues, “If I let you stay just a little longer, will you leave my dreams alone?”   
“If you don’t want me to enter your dreams, you only need to ask me.”  
“Since when do you do what I ask?” She snorts, folding her hands in her lap.   
“I promise.” Lilith lies, because that’s all she knows what to do in this situation, to stay for just a little longer.   
“In that case,” 

A pause hangs between them. Zelda knows she’s being entirely too selfish, but she can’t help it. She’s always been selfish. She’s always _wanted_ , and she’s always wanted _more_. Perhaps Faustus was right, she was sorely in need of guidance, of a return to the Dark Lord and his ways.   
And yet…

“You’re welcome to stay until I fall asleep. Above the covers.” She clarifies, before laying down in the bed. “Now could you close the door?”  
“Yes ma’am.” Lilith murmurs, gently shutting the door and slipping out of her shoes before she pads barefoot towards the bed and climbs up on top of the covers. 

She doesn’t know what she’s doing here, she thinks to herself as she lays on her back and looks up at the shadows on the ceiling. Is she allowed to look at Zelda? Is she allowed to touch her? Is even allowed to breathe? “Oh Mary,” Zelda finally sighs before she runs her hand through those brown waves then guides her head to turn over and look at her, her body following suit. “You really aren’t one of us, are you?”  
“What do you mean?”  
“Human.” Zelda lies, holding the other woman’s blue gaze in her green one, trying to find the demon that must lurk beneath, but all she sees is shadows and darkness and it makes her feel emptier than her sessions with Faustus. Perhaps he was right? No, she knows he’s right. So why is she still here with this being? This creature that couldn’t care less for her? Who was trying to stand between her and the eternal love of Satan himself? 

And why did she want to stay like this forever?

“Zelda?” Lilith eventually asks, unsure of what to do to fill out the silence that has fallen between them, “Did you want me to sing to you?”  
“What?” She can’t hold her laughter in, “Satan alive, no. Why would I want that?”  
“I don’t know…isn’t that what people do?”  
“I…” She continues to laugh, “I…no, Mary, do not sing to me.”  
“Then what should I do? Just stay here watching you?”  
Zelda tucks a stray strand of hair behind Mary’s ear (next to sex, that’s her favourite thing to do to Mary, with Mary, to try to set her to rights knowing that nothing about her would ever stay put, even for a moment. Everything about her just radiates with energy) and realises Faustus was right, this will only lead to trouble. “You can leave.”  
“I don’t want to,” Lilith counters, “It’s just when we’re in bed, we’re usually doing something…else and we don’t have to it’s just…where do I put my hands?”   
“Fine,” Zelda sighs, her voice much more dramatic, much more upset than she actually is. It makes sense now, at least in some small way. Demon or not, Mary was a solitary creature, unfamiliar with being in presence of people, of just being. She struggles to tug the covers out from under Mary’s body.  
“What are you doing?”   
“Just lift…” She gets the last of it out with a good yank, “There. Now get underneath.” She drapes the blanket over Mary’s body, but it still feels wrong - Mary’s body too stiff to allow either of them to get comfortable. “Over,” She commands, “Over, over.” She repeats, waving her hand until Lilith rolls herself over, her back to the other woman. Zelda loosely drapes an arm around her waist. “Is that better?” She asks, trying not to lose herself in the softness of the moment. “Shouldn’t I hold you?” Mary asks, confused, but not wanting to rock the boat. She was unsure of what Zelda wanted or needed, but if it was in her powers to provide it, she would.  
“Do I strike you as the type of person who needs holding?” Zelda snarks, her face twisting into disgust.  
“I…” Lilith doesn’t know how to answer that. So she lays there, her mouth opening and closing until it was too late, too much time had passed and saying anything would’ve been too awkward.

And so they stayed this way for what felt like hours to Lilith, until her back starts to seize up and her calf muscle begins to cramp. Zelda had fallen asleep ages ago, she could tell from the change in her breathing, her hearing become attuned to each hitch of her breath until it stills and evens out, a soft in and out. She knows she can’t stay, she doesn’t want to, but the idea of leaving doesn’t seem right either. Still, she gently eases herself out from under Zelda’s arm and rises from the bed. Against her better judgement, she turns to look for moment and takes in her in, all of her. She can’t recall the last time she was able to watch Zelda sleep, it seemed the woman was always up before her in the mornings, preparing to slip out of the cottage and return to her real life. Now though, Lilith can see the darkness under the eyes, the natural frown her brow bends in, the hard fists her hands had curled into since they had no one to hold onto. She watch her for a moment and a slow sense of terror overcomes her. 

Her. Lilith, Mother of Demons and Witches alike. 

She walks the darkened room and examines every darkened inch and corner for a spell, a ward, a sign of a wayward demon foolish enough to play with one of her toys but there is nothing outside of the residual magic of the Spellmans. It’s that which scares her, the unknown cause or root of her terror which has taken up residence in the belly of her body and slowly coils itself over her organs and squeezes them tightly. She glances back at the body and a wave of fear hits her once more. She doesn’t know why it scares her or why she did it. She wants to touch her but she’s buried beneath the blankets. Still, Lilith runs her hand over her covered leg, her hip, the swell of her breast and the slope of her shoulder peaking out over the blanket, skin still bath-softened and glowing like alabaster against the shadow. 

They used to make figures of Lilith out of alabaster - how she loved to look at them at night when her temples were empty - how they made her look beautiful, how they made her look alive. Her hand floats up into the tumble of her hair. She could kill Zelda right here, right now, and it would be fine. Her borrowed heart begins to beat faster at the thought. She wouldn’t miss her, because she would always be able to have her, wouldn’t she? She would always be hers to play with in Hell. She wants her, she wants her so badly she can taste her - but she won’t do that. She wants to, but won’t. Let Zelda come to her, let Zelda want her. Her fingers tighten their grip of her hair and she realises she’s woken Zelda, her eyes fluttering open as if she’s still dreaming. 

Her eyes are sleepy and startlingly bright - like the jewels they used to use in the statues of Lilith herself - and Lilith can’t turn away. Each woman watches the other, and before either knows what’s happening, one of them rises, one of them bends, and they meet somewhere in the middle with a kiss as soft as a mouthful of tea, of a flame blown out, of music being played somewhere down the hall… A sigh and then it’s over. Zelda returns to sleep and Lilith, well, Lilith stands there, shellshocked. 

She knows God is real. She has seen their face and their cruelty. Perhaps that’s what this is too, the cruelty of God on display by torturing her with this woman? 

This life isn’t for her. This realm isn’t hers, she doesn’t belong here.

She doesn’t belong anywhere.

Satan, she can still feel Faustus around her, around them. The bath may have removed his scent, but not the traces of his magic, his power over her, whatever it may be. Her skin itches and she contemplates purifying Zelda with fire - a candle and a prayer over body - but instead opts to fling the curtains open, letting the moon pour over her, it’s light being another source of purification as well. 

And that’s when it hits her again.

There’s a creak over her shoulder - the door opens, but no one is there. A sign to leave, and so she does, closing the door and charming it behind her. 

She steps out into the hall where Salem sits patiently, watching her. In the past she’d kick him for looking at her like that. “What do you want?” She hisses, but he continues to stand there, silent, with his head cocked as if he enjoys watching her in the midst of her existential dilemma. “Oh, go to hell you brat.” She mutters, taking care to step on his tail as she makes her way to the stairs.

Lilith is almost down the stairs when Salem saunters by her and pads towards the kitchen, still glowing with a soft light. Peeking in, she sees a blonde head bowed over open books, “Sabrina? What are you still doing studying?”  
“Oh, Ms. Wardwell.” Sabrina raises her head and smiles, “How’s Aunt Zelda?”  
“Oh, she’s fine. She’s sleeping.”  
“Rough night for her?”  
“Something like that.” Lilith shrugs, realising they didn’t really get into details, but then again, how much detail is necessary when your back looks like a roadmap? “She’ll be fine.” Lilith says, not sure why she’s lying to the child.  
“Sure she will.” Sabrina agrees, lying right back at her.  
“You should sleep, Sabrina. Hilda’s right. Your mortal half still needs rest.”  
“I will, soon. I promise. I just..”  
“You just?”  
“Want to do well.” Sabrina admits, exhaustion evident in her eyes.  
“I’m sure you do, but you won’t if you fall asleep in the middle of an exam.”

Lilith looks at her, really looks (she isn’t sure what’s gotten into her, but she wants it to stop). She’s a child. Suddenly, she feels very tired. She feels…her age.

“Good night Sabrina.” She sighs. Lilith doesn’t remember being that young (was she ever? Or was she born a woman before she was made a monster?) but she knows the child won’t go to sleep tonight.   
“Good night Ms. Wardwell.” Sabrina smiles before returning to her books.  


* * *

  
The fresh air perks Lilith up. She takes a lungful of it, it no longer burns her. She no longer misses the heat of Hell as desperately as she once did. She begins to walk down the gravel drive and gets to her car. From where she stands, she can see Zelda’s window and for just a moment, she swears she sees someone, something in there, watching her. 

She blinks, and the feeling passes.

She gets into her car and turns the ignition, thankful she doesn’t need sleep… She has somewhere to be, and something to do.  


* * *

  
Faustus wakes in the morning with a smile and a stretch (it’s hard not to smile when you’ve been favoured by the Dark Lord, after all) when he feels something… cold and damp between his legs. His heart drops and stills. He kicks the covers back and stares at the bloody mess between his legs. His hands scramble downward and feels himself. Everything is intact. A deep breath of relief before he moves down and sees that between the sheets and the blood is a dove, a (formerly) white dove staked to his bed. He goes to touch it - there’s entirely too much blood for it to have been just from this bird - and his hand recoils as if burned. No, not from the bird but from the stake. He gathers the fabric from the sheet in his hand and gingerly pulls it out of the delicate body - a cross… A fucking cross. 

A fucking consecrated cross.

There’s not a single doubt in his mind who left this for him.

There’s something he’s missing, and if there’s one thing he hates, it’s being out of the circle, of missing out. Why would that bitch care what he does with Zelda? Why does the Dark Lord care either? What is it about the fucking Spellmans? Why does the entirety of the dark world bow know of them and cater to them? He remembers in school how everyone seemed to defer to Edward and Zelda, and then when Edward was High Priest, no one would shut up about about them. And now…Satan and that demonic bitch both going after Zelda? There must be something to them. 

Fine then, if they want the Spellmans, he wants them too. He’ll figure it out why they’re important after he lands them. First Zelda, and then Sabrina, and if need be, that cousin of sorts and that half-wit Hilda too. It galls him that the key to power lies in their hands, but if they have value to the Dark Lord, they have value to him.  


* * *

  
Zelda has spent the last three hours pouring over the dark scriptures. Even when the tears have blurred her vision, it didn’t matter - she knew every word, every verse, every chapter. She recites them to herself over and over and over again. She doesn’t hear the others rise and ready themselves for the day. She doesn’t hear the ancient plumbing creak and ping as the water begins to flow, or breakfast being made, or Salem scratching at her door. It’s not until Hilda knocks softly, asking if she’s up, if she’s alright, does she come to. 

She wipes her tears away and realises the sun is out. What she wouldn’t give to be able to hide out in her room, to invite Hilda in, to do anything but leave… It’s all getting to be too much. Letty and Mary and Faustus and yes, even her own family. Everyone just needs from her. No, she’s stronger than this. She knows it. She’s stronger than her dreams. He hadn’t visited her dreams in a very long time. But this was different, he was so real. He was so real. He was so angry.

No, she will shake it off. She will move forward, she will move on. She’ll figure this all out, she always has, hasn’t she?

She closes her bible and places it back on her nightstand and rises. She flicks her hand to make the bed as she enters the washroom, brushes her teeth, washes her face. Satan, her face and hair were a mess, she realises, taking a harsh look at herself in the mirror. She’ll have to glamour herself this morning, not having the heart or the energy to do everything herself. She sighs and returns to her room, ready to get dressed and flicks her hand to make the bed.

Nothing.

She tries it again.

No, no, no, no no nononono. 

The bed remains unmade. She tries to shut the door, turn on the sink, close the blinds - anything - but nothing happens. She has no magic.

She has no magic.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **AN2:** Title from Perfume Genius’ Queen (Don't you know your queen / Whipped / Heaving / Flower bloom at my feet) … Which is … Genius… And very much the perfect song for both Lilith and Zelda in different capacities.
> 
> **AN3:** Pretty sure Zelda (and formerly Hilda's) room doesn't have an en suite bathroom, but let's go with it.
> 
> **AN4:** I can’t believe ‘Where do I put my hands?’ made it into this fic (a shorthand with friends about describing an emotionally uncomfortable situation, but honestly, don’t you ever wonder where to you put your hands?)


	7. No Devils Here

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Strip the powers away from a witch and it was like severing their soul from their body, they become weak, they become dependant on others for survival and protection. 
> 
> They become human. 
> 
> Mortal.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **AN1/TW:** Implied sexual assault (coercion) - there’s nothing graphic, but clear implication of it. Mentions of the death of a baby (nothing graphic, but references some of the concepts of limbo which may be hard to read/think about). Some blood from an injury. Consensual bleeding, but not quite self-harm. There’s some magical violence around boundaries of consent being tested, but nothing too extreme within the bounds of Zelda and Lilith’s relationship, but the previous warning stands. Basically, lmk if you skip this chapter/section and I can provide a tl;dr.

  


* * *

  


  
_“A confession is also a dare is also a compulsion” This Is How You Lose the Time War_  


* * *

  


It’s the same dream. The crying. There’s so much crying. Both him and the baby - her aching heart. The all-consuming love washing over her as she looks down into the crib and the dread and despair at finding it empty.

It’s always empty.  


* * *

  
Morax (Maury, to his friends, of whom he has many I assure you), the bull-headed Great Earl of Hell, ruler of the Eastern Shores of the Sulphur Sea of Hell watches from the woods as the Spellman woman is finally let into Lilith’s shack. He wonders if she knows the truth - not about the situation, no, but about ‘Mary’. Satan, he though, Lilith always _did_ have a flair for the dramatics but calling herself Mary is a particularly nice touch. He gently strokes the head of one of his demon dogs who wordlessly understands what is required of them. Confidant in that, Maury turns with his other demonic companion and soon they disappear, leaving one lonely guard to watch and to wait.  


* * *

  
“Why didn’t you let yourself in?” Lilith asks, confused and a little out of breath from running to the door. “You were pretty eager to show that trick off t-”  
“If I could, don’t you think I would’ve?” Zelda snaps, tearing open the front of her coat and beginning to circle the room like an anxious animal.  
“What do you mean?”  
“My magic, it’s gone.”  
“Gone?” Lilith asks, “What do you mean gone? Where did they - stop pacing, you’re making me sick.”  
“Sick?! How do you think I feel?” Zelda hisses, shaking with rage. “What did you do to me?”  
“Me?!” The concept confuses her, why would Zelda accuse her?  
“Who else would’ve taken my powers? It couldn’t have been Faustus, he’s barely competent, and it can’t be someone else from the coven, we can bind, but we can’t **revoke** and mine are **gone**. Do you understand? **_Gone_**. Hilda has more power than I do. Hell, at this point, even Vinegar Tom-”  
“Who?”  
“My familiar!”  
“The dead dog?”  
“He’s not dead,” She bites, “And that’s beside the point. The point is, my excommunicated sister and my familiar have more powers than I do and I want to know why, and I want to know how to get them back. I just want them back.” She pulls up short in front of Mary and pleads softly, her eyes desperate, “I just want them back. Please, Mary. Whatever you’ve done, I want them back.”  
“Zelda, I don’t have them,” She admits, skin squirming at all this earnest emotion coming from Zelda, “I can’t give back what I never took.”  
“Don’t say that Mary, don’t lie to me.” Her eyes narrow, her desperation cools to a glacial chill. “Only Satan, only demons, can do this.” Zelda doesn’t beg, but she’s ready to if that’s what it takes. “Mary - I can’t be without them. I haven’t been without them like this. Never. It feels like I’m dying, like I’m all alone and I am disconnected from everything and everyone and I am being left to die so whatever you need to do, I need you to do it. I need you to give them back to me. And if you didn’t take them, then this is a punishment for -”

Of course. It all falls into place for Lilith. This is a punishment, just not for Zelda. This is for her. 

Well shit. **Now** , what does she do? 

“Zelda, I need you to calm down.”  
“You calm down,” She shoots back, taking a book and launching it across the room, ready to cry when it barely bounces off the wall.  
“I’m not the one circling here like a goldfish in a bowl. I need you to calm down. I’m going to make tea, and when I get back, you’re going to walk me through everything.”  
“I don’t want tea.”  
“That’s what you humans do in times of stress, isn’t it?”  
“We’re not British.”  
“Hilda is. Why is that, by the way?”  
“Fuck you is why.”  
“Language.” Lilith chides. “I’ll be right back.” She starts to move towards the kitchen and notices Zelda following her, “You’re staying here.”  
“But-”  
“Here,” Lilith repeats forcefully before hurrying out of the room. 

She needs space and she needs time to think, to sort this out and plan her next steps, and not just on a metaphoric level, but on an actual, practical level - she had no idea what to do with Zelda, who was circling the walls of the next room over. Lilith could feel the terror and rage radiating off of her even from here. She pours water into the kettle and absentmindedly lights the flame with her own magic, her mind racing all the while. Zelda was right, only Satan, only a demon of the highest order could do this, and no one she knows is foolish enough to threaten a human who smells of her. And Zelda does smell of her, her scent is all over her, she couldn’t have helped it if she wanted to, and she certainly didn’t want to.

Shit, shit, shit.

She is in so much trouble. She’s fairly certain she can restore Zelda’s power. The question is, should she? Will she? What does she care if Zelda remains powerless? So what if the other woman’s age catches up with her and she dies? She’s always yammering on about the ‘Dark Father’, let her be sent home to him. Let her see what devotion means when he’s not some sort of dark, abstract deity, but a living, breathing entity heaven-bound to grind you beneath his cloven hoof until you’re nothing. Let her see what that’s like. Let her see the truth. Let her see him for -

The kettle lets out a long, loud whistle which brings Lilith back to this realm. 

To leave Zelda powerless, literally powerless, it to leave her to die, or worse, to turn to Faustus Blackwood for help. To return her powers back to her is to go against the Dark Lord himself, to contradict him, to stand in the way of his plan (whatever it may be). 

It’s that simple, it really is. 

She begins to prepare tea because she knows how to do that now. She pulls out the tray and the teapot and with more care than she realizes, measures out the leaves (half cardamom, half English Breakfast) and pours over the water. She remembers to set the sugar cubes (more for herself than for Zelda, who drinks it over-steeped and bitter) as well as the remnants of the whiskey bottle and she carries it all into the front room. Even from across the room, Lilith can smell the iron in the air from where Zelda has worried her lip with her teeth until it bled. “Sit.”  
“No.”  
“I can’t help unless you tell me what happened.” Lilith lies, “So sit.” She pours the whiskey into the teacup and tops it off with a splash of tea before handing it off to the other woman who has begrudgingly settled on the couch, one crossed leg bouncing with complete fear. “You’re getting uncomfortably good at this,” Zelda mutters.  
“What?”  
“Approximations of comfort.”  
“Well if you wouldn’t go and get yourself into these situations, I wouldn’t need to.” Lilith comments, pouring her own cup of tea, thankful for having something to do to stall for time, even if it is only a few more minutes. “At least we now know where Sabrina gets it from.”  
“Not from me. Nothing like this happened before you appeared and decided to ruin my life.”  
“Impossible, you ruined mine.” Lilith shrugs before taking a sip.  
“I shouldn’t even be here. If this is a punishment, it’s because of you. It’s about you. I should leave.” Zelda theorizes.  
“If that’s how you feel, there’s the door. You can always try Faustus. You know how to find him.” Lilith sets down her cup and begins to move about the room, closing curtains and doors. “Though I’m fairly certain you know Faustus can’t help you, otherwise you’d be there right now, wouldn’t you?”  
“What are you doing?”  
“Making sure no one can see in. Drink up.”  
“I don’t trust you,” Zelda admits, her tone harsher than she intended.  
“First sensible thing you’ve said in weeks, but I assure you that’s nothing but whiskey and tea.” They lock eyes, and Lilith eventually shrugs, “Fine, don’t drink it. I don’t particularly care.” She doesn’t, not really. She cares about what decision she’s going to make in the next five minutes. “Tell me what happened.”  
“I woke up, I had no powers. End of story.”  
“I gathered,” Lilith snaps back. She’s already on edge and doesn’t need Zelda’s aggression on top of it. “I need a little more information if I’m going to try to fix it.”  
“Try? You have to do more than try, you have to give me my powers back.”  
“Believe me, I’d love to if only to shut you up Zelda. Now, once more, with feeling.”  
“I woke up-”  
“Did you have any strange dreams?”  
“Yes.”  
“About?”  
“Doesn’t matter.” Zelda deflects, stirring her tea to keep her hands busy.  
“I’m pretty sure it does.”

Zelda sets her jaw, very much like a petulant Sabrina. She takes a sip of the luke-warm spinster’s tea.

“Edward.” She lies, “He was upset.”  
“At?”  
“Me. You. I’ve never seen him so angry.” She sets her cup down on the table and continues. “I woke up and it was still early, so I read my Satanic Scriptures until it was time to get up. I went to wash my face and when I came back into my room I realized my bed wasn’t made. And before you insult me,” She cuts off Mary, “I have cast the same spell every day since I was six. It wasn’t the spell.”  
“And then?”  
“I tried a few other spells, simple stuff, candles, glamours, opening doors - none of it worked. I went to the Academy with Ambrose and Sabrina, and I made them open the doors for me.”  
“Clever.”  
“I had students do **everything** for me to avoid anyone noticing, I avoided the faculty and Faustus, and as soon as classes ended, I came here.”  
“Why?”  
“Because you’d know how to help me.” And then she looks at Lilith, really looks at her until Lilith has to turn away, terrified by what she sees. She hates that she will return Zelda’s powers back to her, even if it means betraying Satan because frankly, she’s tired. 

She’s tired of a lot of things. 

Maybe she’ll leave Greendale when this is all over? She mulls her options over in the back of her mind as she wanders about the room. Maybe she can find a place on earth where he’d never find her? She picks up Zelda’s abandoned teacup and warms it back up silently and hands it back to her. “Drink up. I’ll be back.” She goes to her room (funny how she thinks of this cottage as hers now, this life, these awful, awful students all as hers) and collects and fills an old washbasin from the bathroom, retrieves a handful of candles and returns to the living room where Zelda sits on the edge of the couch. How…odd she looks. Not quite frail, but changed in some way. Not even at her worst did she radiate this nervous, terrified energy. All it would take was one wrong step, word, and she’d wreak as much havoc as her physical body could generate. “Get that table for me?” Lilith asks, snapping the other woman out of her own thought, “And turn off the lights.” 

Soon, they’re ready - standing opposite each other, the basin between them - illuminated by the light of candles that surrounds them. “This may sting,” Lilith murmurs, before slicing Zelda’s palm wide open. She pretends not to notice that the other woman doesn’t flinch at what should hurt. Instead, she holds the hand above the water, letting the blood run into it until it grows darker and darker. A waste of witch’s blood, but necessary. When it’s gotten dark enough, when Zelda’s bled enough, she presses their palms together and heals the wound shut. She doesn’t look at Zelda, who’s looking at her, watching her heal her for the first time. She doesn’t look at Zelda who twines their fingers together for a moment before swiftly letting go. 

Lilith swallows whatever that feeling that she’s feeling is called and begins to swirl the water with her powers, noting its resistance, as if digging in its heels and submitting to her against its own will. She stops and looks up at the general direction of Zelda and hates her even more for looking like she does in the glow of the candles. Even magic-less, there’s a fierce beauty, a strength that makes itself known at the oddest, most unexpected times. It’s almost as if there’s a mark upon her, upon all the Spellman women. A brand upon the heart, their destiny written upon the forehead - Lilith doesn’t realize she’s reaching her hand out towards her until Zelda ducks it instinctively. “What?” She asks, suspicious, and bringing Lilith back.  
“It’s not bound.”  
“I told you.” Zelda snaps quietly. “It feels nothing like being bound, it’s been stripped.”  
“You’ve been bound before?”  
“Who hasn’t?” Zelda shrugs.  
“How do you feel?”  
“How would you feel?” 

Lilith knows how she would feel because she’s felt it, many, many times. This is one of Satan’s favourite punishments to inflict. To sever a being’s connection to their spirit which is the seat of their power. He wasn’t the first to do it to her. Still, she shakes those thoughts from her mind and smiles widely. “Let’s get started, shall we?”

Together, they extinguish the candles in the basin of bloody water until they stand together in the dark. Hands locked together held above the bowl once more, Lilith begins her incantation, with Zelda repeating after her. “Solvite me vobis, Solvite me vobis, Solvite me vobis.”  
_“Solvite me vobis, Solvite me vobis, Solvite me vobis.”_  
“Potestate vestra revertetur.”  
_“Potestate vestra revertetur.”_  
“Ut custodiat te. Ut custodiat te. Ut custodiat te.”  
_“Ut custodiat te. Ut custodiat te. Ut custodiat te.”_  
“Ego lux: et benedicat tibi”  
_“Ego lux: et benedicat tibi."_

They begin again, and again, and again, both willing power into Zelda’s body - drawing it from the ground, the air, the forest outside. They repeat the spell countless times until something sparks and catches, a mystical flint stone igniting the charged magic around them until it flows through Zelda, through the room. The basin between them shakes under the force of the liquid spinning and swirling within it. Zelda unlocks their hands and lets her returning powers rush over her, through her, in and around her. She lights the candles, she moves the table, she reheats her tea to the point of boiling and shatters the cup and saucer. She closes her eyes and lets her magic reach out and fill the room, lets it manifest itself as it brushes through Mary’s hair, over Mary’s skin, around Mary’s waist, drawing her clos-

Everything goes black for a split second as she hits the wall.

Mary did that, Mary standing before her looking every inch a demon in sheep’s clothing, with the fury of hell behind her eyes. 

“I’m sorry.” Zelda isn’t sure, but she thinks she’s the one who apologizes, pushing her body up off the floor, a careful eye on the demon in the centre of the room, breathing deeply, struggling to contain her own overflowing power. Zelda realizes this is the first time she’s seen Mary in this state, and it intrigues her. She approaches her slowly, the return of her magic has flooded her senses and set them all on fire. She wanted Mary last night, and she wants Mary now. 

She wants Mary.

Before Zelda can take the next step, she feels Mary’s magic push her back on the couch and grins down at her like the fucking demon that she was, and Zelda cannot wait to push her power up against this demon’s once more. “You ought to be kept in a cage,” Zelda grins, lust and want and magic pouring out of her.  
“Is that right?” Mary asks, deadly serious in her desire for the other woman. She didn’t like seeing her scared, no, she much prefers Zelda when she’s inspiring fear in others. Somewhere in the back of her mind, in the depths of where her soul used to reside, she makes a promise that Zelda will never feel that scared, that powerless, ever again. She doesn’t realize she’s made it, no, she’s too busy, too focused on the woman she’s straddling, pushing into the fabric of the couch, the same one who’s pawing her, tugging at her, intent on devouring her with her tongue and teeth and fingertips. There is no gentleness to them - only two beings exploring the full breadth and depth of their powers against each other, with each other.  


* * *

  
Faustus has no warning this time, the walls simply part and Maury stands before him.

“Oh, uh. Hello.” He makes an unsure effort at a bow, “An unexpected pleasure.”  
“I’m sure,” Maury asks, sniffing the air. “Dove’s blood?”  
“An accident.” He lies. “How may I be of service to the Dark Lord and yourself?”  
“The Dark Lord isn’t particularly impressed, Blackwood. Or happy. He’s wondering why Zelda Spellman is with someone who’s not you…? He wants to know what would it take to express to you the importance of his task. Perhaps your son can help-”  
“Judas?” Faustus asks as Maury shrugs his shoulders, unable or unwilling to care about the child’s name before he flicks two fingers and suddenly the sounds of Judas’ wails bounce off the hallway walls and down into his room. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I thought - I didn’t - please stop it -” He catches the glint in Maury’s eyes and corrects himself, clarifies his request. “Please stop hurting him. I will, I will, I promise, I will get Zelda, I will separate her from Mary Wardwell and -”

The crying stops. 

“Is he alright?” Faustus asks, eyeing the door, but terrified to turn his back on the demon.  
“He’s fine. Or he will be. A bad dream Blackwood, nothing more.” Maury pours himself a drink from the bar cart in the corner, unimpressed with the selection, but drinks from it anyways. “And do you know who Mary Wardwell is?”  
“They are a demon, an emissary from the Dark Lord I was told.”  
“Show the Spellman woman the light, Blackwood. Show her the path she must take. For your sake.” 

With that, he deposits the empty glass on Faustus’ desk and returns to passage created upon his arrival and leaves Faustus scrambling for a plan.  


* * *

  
They lay spent on the floor, lit only by a candle or two, lit with a lazy hand gesture from where they were currently sprawled, all arms and legs and tangled hair. Each of them was lost in thought - Zelda absentmindedly running her fingers through Mary’s mane of hair while she reevaluates every life choice that has lead her to this moment. - this exact moment where Satan himself sought to bless her with a clear path to power in the form of Faustus Blackwood, and instead, she chooses to roll around on the floor with a demon who’s entirely not part of the plan. And yet, despite the clear cut mistakes she’s making with her life (and they are **so** obvious), she can’t feel bad about it. Not really. Not yet. Endorphins are still flooding her body and brain - it’s why she doesn’t really mind the hard floor beneath her, or the weight of Mary’s head on her ribs, running a slow hand up and down her belly.

Her belly.

Zelda tries to shift around, her free hand feeling around for her slip, Mary’s blouse, anything to cover up, but nothing is in reach. She releases a gentle breath and uses her magic to push it far enough to extinguish one of the candles, leaving behind nothing more than the rising smoke. “Mmmm.” Mary wonders, not quite moving from where she’s made her nest, but aware something somewhere has changed. “It was nothing.” Zelda murmurs, “Just blew out a candle. Too bright.”  
“Mmmm,” Mary repeats, still thinking. Her fingers still skimming up and down the soft swell of the hip. She likes the flesh of this body more than she can recall ever liking another’s. Strange - she recalls wanting to devour it when this all started and now, she’s doing everything she can to keep it intact, together, skin and sinew and muscle and soul all bound up. The stripping of powers was only the start, a message from Satan to tell Lilith he knew. What he knew didn’t matter - he knew. Strip the powers away from a witch and it was like severing their soul from their body, they become weak, they become dependant on others for survival and protection. 

They become human. 

Mortal.

The thought of Zelda as a mortal upsets her and she doesn’t know why. Her fingers worry a lacy patch of Zelda’s skin where the candlelight casts its dim light oddly as she continues thinking about what she had done. Satan had drawn a line in the sand and she had somehow found herself planted firmly on the other side. She was dead, or good as. Could she even die? What is death like for a demon? For a goddess? She feels Zelda brush her hand aside, but she doesn’t object, only moving her hand back to where it was. She had somehow chosen to die for this woman, and she doesn’t even know why. Her own stupidity astounds her sometimes. She knew the correct thing to do, she always did. But where was the fun in that? That would’ve made her laugh earlier, or grin, or chuckle. Now it just makes her think. Fuck this realm, and fuck this existence. Maybe death wouldn’t be so bad - it’s not like she still had a soul to be damned, or to have live on, does she? No, no. If she still had a soul, she’d know about it. Zelda’s hand wraps around hers again, and again she moves it down onto her thigh, gripping it tightly to prevent her from moving it up again, but all this does is give Lilith’s eyes a focus. She doesn’t need the light of a candle like a wolf doesn’t need the light of the moon. She simply sees it - the light lines stretching even whiter - almost glowing - against already pale skin. “You had a child.” Lilith realizes, raising her head and looking up at the other woman - finally connecting everything… 

Everything in the room stops - even the final candle - somewhere in the corner - appears to stop moving, it too holding its breath in anticipation. “Yes,” Zelda admits, before sliding out from beneath the other woman’s weight and gathering her clothes. “What happened?” Lilith asks, the words out before she knows it. She sits up from where they were laid out upon the floor, watching Zelda move and dress in the semi-darkness. Things start to make sense in a twisted way: the sadness and the despair she had once tasted in her blood all those months ago. The bassinet in her dreams. The insistence of a slip, or a blanket, or anything really, artfully draped across her. She feels the air change, Zelda’s made it to the front door and is about to leave, when Lilith magics it shuts.  
“I want to leave,” Zelda demands.  
“Tell me what happened.”  
“Why?”  
“Because,” Lilith shrugs, unsure why she’s trapping the woman here. “I asked.”  
“No,” Zelda states, arms crossed, eyes defiant.  
“Fine.” Lilith unlatches the door from across the room, “I just thought…”  
“You just thought…what? Because we occasionally see each other, I’m going to turn my back on the path Satan set for me? Or tell you every last detail of my past? You must be insane.” A hollow laugh rings out.

They stare at each other for a moment in the near darkness of the room - their pulses racing, blood pounding betraying the coolness of their stand-off. 

“Well, give my best to Faustus,” Lilith dismisses her, flicking her finger and opening the door. “Don’t forget to lock up. Satan knows what might be out there.” She stretches briefly, pretending to ignore the fact that Zelda hasn’t left yet. She bends her neck to one side and then the other before she walks past Zelda, towards the darkened kitchen where she begins to forage through the fridge for something, anything. She can feel Zelda’s eyes on her from down the hall but is too engrossed in tamping down her rage - imagine, she thinks to herself, imagine the gall it takes to stand before Lilith herself, Lilith, who has just drawn a metaphorical line in the metaphorical sand with the very real Devil himself, all for the worthless soul of an ungrateful, opportunistic witch like Zelda Spellman. Imagine! She slams the fridge out and turns around. “Oh, you’re still here.” She eyes Zelda, near-nude, her clothes gathered in her arms, looking lost and old and powerless. If she had a heart, Lilith would swear it was breaking at the sight.  
“You have a scar on your left arm, just above the elbow, how did you get it?” The other woman asks, dropping everything on the table before moving towards Lilith but not touching her. “Or the one above your right ankle?”  
“I, I don’t know. This isn’t my body Zelda, it’s a dress, a suit, a second skin of sorts, borrowed.” She admits, unflinching from the other woman’s gaze.  
“So this isn’t a glamour?” She finally reaches a hand out and runs a finger along Mary’s clavicle, down her sternum, as if looking for a seam, a zipper, anything which would reveal the truth within.  
“No glamour.”  
“I see.” She snatches her hand back. “So, here you are, standing before me, in the finest of human skins this town could provide -”  
“You really think it’s the finest?” She preens.  
“And yet you think you have the right to demand I tell you about my…”  
“Child.”  
“Myself. Why? What have you done for me?”  
“You don’t know what I’ve done for you, Zelda.”  
“Then tell me.” She challenges, her face set firmly in a look of boredom and defiance. “Show me.”  
“Show you what?”

That’s the real question, isn’t it? Hanging in the air between them. Not just for Zelda and Lilith, but for all lovers everywhere. Just how much does one want to reveal, and just how much does the other want to see? 

“Show me what’s underneath, Mary. Give me a name, perhaps? A real name.”  
“And why would I?”  
“Because I asked.” Zelda offers. “Because I know next to nothing about the…being-” She waves a hand in Lilith’s general direction, “I’ve been running off and spending my nights with and I suppose I’d like to know something about them.”  
“It doesn’t matter though, does it?”  
“How can you say that?”  
“Because it’s true. You don’t really care about any of this.” She waves a hand around herself, a mocking of Zelda’s earlier gesture. “You’ve made it perfectly clear you only care what it can do for you. No, don’t get modest now Zelda, I find it refreshing actually. That level of self-serving honesty is very attractive, you know.”  
“No, I don’t know, actually.” Zelda huffs, rolling her eyes in a show of disinterest. “I was just trying to feign interest was all.”  
“Oh, was that all? And what do you call what I was doing then?”  
“Prying.”  
“And the difference?” Lilith asks.  
“Intention.” Zelda offers, “Meaning. Cruelty.”  
“Cruelty? What a word to use Zelda when I’ve been nothing but gentle and pleasing. In fact, I’ve been downright pleasant, I dare say.” Acid drips off every word coming out of Lilith’s mouth.  
“The answer to that particular question is neither gentle nor pleasant.”  
“Neither are the answers to any question you may have.”  
“Even your name?”  
“Even my name,” Lilith confirms as they stand off against each other, hackles raised. How easy it would be for one of them, either one of them, to retreat and stand down, but that not how either of them exists within the world. No, for these two, the bigger the challenge, the greater the desire to best it, beat it, defeat it, and so they stand at attention, battle-ready in the moonlit kitchen, shivering, but unwilling to bend. “What was its name, Zelda?”  
“What’s yours, **Mary**?” She shoots back.  
“You’ll learn it soon enough. What if I tell you something else about me?”  
“I want a memory,” Zelda responds. “I want something of the past that hurt you.”  
“And just what will you give me if I tell you?” Mary asks, leaning into Zelda’s space only to reach past her and select an apple off the fruit bowl. She begins to circle the small kitchen as she begins to skin the apple in hand, she circles the other woman as the knife circles the surface of the fruit. “What will you give me for my pain, Zelda? And what makes you think I want it?”

The apple peel falls onto the ground in a single unbroken strip.

Lilith begins to segment the apple in hand and offers a piece up to Zelda, who rather than taking the piece, runs a finger along the trail of juice running down Mary’s wrist, before placing it in her mouth. “Oh dear,” Lilith sighs, “What would you be like if you didn’t try so hard?” She takes a slice of her own offerings and begins to eat it. “You should run away with me,” Lilith offers, leaning back on the kitchen counter. “Might be good for you, see the world? Shed this Baby Jane act.” From this angle, in this darkness, she can’t see Zelda’s reaction, so she continues to slice off thin wedges of the fruit and chews them slowly. Of all the fruits of this realm, there was still something oddly comforting about the apple to her. When she finishes, she turns to leave the core and the knife in the sink, turning on the faucet, rinsing her hands under the stream before cupping them and taking a sip from them, no point in dirtying a cup, she thinks to herself. She turns off the faucet with her elbow and then reaches for a dish towel to dry her hands on, her own nudity preventing her from her usual gesture of rubbing them down her front. “I almost drowned once.” She finally offers, her voice too casual, as she hangs the towel back up and turns around. “Is that the sort of thing you want to know?”  
“Did it hurt?” Zelda asks, watching. Her heart, if it weren’t too heavy with its own sorrows, would go out to the demon before her - but she can barely keep her head above her own grief to care about Mary’s. She doesn’t know why she asked. She doesn’t know why she’s still here. She just needs to know that someone, anyone, has felt even a small part of the pain that is lodged deep within her. “I was also burned once, more than once actually,” Lilith continues, “Don’t recommend it. But I almost drowned once,” She repeats, “I remember fighting to keep my head above the waves for oh, Satan knows how long-” Her voice almost breaks at the thought of being left for so long, not by the False God, but by Lucifer himself, “Gave up a couple of times, only to have my body fight against it, rise up. Do you know what it’s like for your body to fight to stay alive when all you want to do is die?” She eyes the woman before her, “Maybe you do, I don’t know. Weeks of just choking on poisoned water, dodging debris and rotting, animal carcasses. The smell of wet fur. Of liquifying flesh. The fat just…” She fights to keep her stomach from roiling up at thinking of the smell. Of seeing the glistening fat float on the surface. Of being wet and cold, her own skin stretching until it almost burst. It wasn’t true that everything outside the arc died. 

They just wished they did.

Still, it was better than fire. “Well,” She shrugs, pulling herself out of her thoughts, her face pulling back into a tight smile “Is that enough bloodletting, or does Ms. Spellman want more?” She asks, “I’d hate for her to leave **displeased** in some way.”

“No,” Zelda trails off, biting back a remark of how deranged Mary looked, how sad. “That’s enough for now.” She looks across the room to the other woman hidden in the shadows from the cabinets and curtains. Part of her wants to touch Mary, just touch her - reassure her with a steady hand and a low hum like she’d done in the past when Mary’s dreams get too close, too violent. The other part of her wants to leave with what little strength and secrets she has left - leave and never return - but she knows deep down in the darkest corner of her soul, that leaving would be next to impossible for her. The realization makes her want to wretch and hits her so hard it takes everything to remain upright - there isn’t even a wall she can lean on. Her shaking hand reaches out for a kitchen chair and she drags it over loudly - the sound of the wooden legs scraping across the linoleum floors echoes through the cottage.

A flock of birds depart from their roost on a tree outside as if they were as jolted by the sound as Mary was. 

“What was its name, Zelda?” Lilith asks from where she leans even further into the shadows, watching Zelda sit in the centre of the moonlight streaming in from the window. She glows so pale she looks unreal, ethereal. “Her.” Zelda corrects sharply.  
“Fine, what was her name?” Lilith asks once more, rolling her eyes at Zelda’s sensitivity. It takes everything to not insult the other woman, to not lash out, but it’s the least she feels she can do, should do, if Zelda herself didn’t mock her earlier. 

She is well aware that sincerity is neither of their strong suits. 

“Lilith.” 

The name rings out strong and clear in the kitchen, and Lilith herself is shaken for a moment at the thought that the memory of the (Great) Flood was too much, too revealing and Zelda was able to piece it together. She lets out a nervous, humourless laugh, “What?”  
“Lilith,” Zelda repeats, her voice edged in glistening knives. “Her name was Lilith.”  
“After…”  
“Yes. There could be no higher honour, no better guiding force for a woman.” Zelda clasps her hands in her lap and tries to keep her eyes on the only part of Mary she can see in the shadows - the right ankle with the mystery scar which all but glows. As difficult as she knows the memory of the flood may have been for her to share, she still can’t help but wish she knew something about the body she wears so well.  
“What happened to her?”  
“She died. Before her forty day blessing.”

The room darkens - clouds have begun to roll in, rapidly blocking out the moon. Lilith can feel the change in the pressure outside.

To die before your forty-day blessing means to live in purgatory, safe from the False God’s cold reach but also to never know the Dark Father’s fiery love. It means almost certainly that there will be no reunion in the afterlife - an eternity of isolation and indifference. She feels in some way for this child she’s never known, if only because she knows in small part what it must be experiencing. She had once spent eons wandering alone - but as much as she felt like a newborn in the world, she was a woman who could learn and grow and move with the stars. This young one would never see the stars, would never grow, never have courage and wisdom and strength - and she would’ve gained all three as the daughter of Zelda Spellman. No, somewhere in purgatory was a child who lies there waiting for someone to pick her up, comfort her, and she would never know that no one would or could ever come - which, come to think of it, Lilith realizes, is very much like life. 

“I’m sorry.” Lilith finally offers - there’s no false emotion, no empathy or sympathy. Only a factual exchange of sorrow at the unfortunate circumstances of her namesake’s death. At not being there for Zelda in her time of need as her true self, as Lilith, Mother of Witches and Demons. How Zelda must’ve cried out for her help, for her to intercede in the happenings, for the strength to overcome them or best them. She tries to remember if she could go back far enough to try to pick out the sounds of Zelda’s cries amongst the others but finds she can’t. There’s been so many over the years, too many. “For what?” Zelda asks, her voice steeling itself into something strong and cold and entirely too familiar “It wasn’t your will, it was the Dark Lord’s.”  
“You don’t know that,” Lilith offers from her dark corner, a shiver passes through her body - the room is getting chillier as the raindrops begin to fall against the windows.  
“I do. It was the Dark Lord’s will and it was the Dark Lord’s lesson.”  
“Lesson?”  
“Aren’t you cold?” Zelda asks, rising, changing the topic. “No, you’re never cold, are you?” She answers to herself as she turns and wanders out of the kitchen and disappears down the hall.

“I’ll start the fire up.” Lilith eventually calls loudly, once she figures out what she should do, where she should go. This… Wasn’t at all how she expected the night to go when Zelda showed up in a panic. She moves off the counter she had been leaning on and enters the main room of the cabin, the last candle having been blown out at some point has left it dark, but she knows the room well enough to make her way over to the fireplace without light. She begins to stack the firewood and crumple the paper, packing in the empty areas with twigs and other kindling - she finds the human method tedious, but she doesn’t know what else to do with herself. Should she find Zelda? Comfort her? Press her for more information? Send her home? There are too many variables, too many options. So she kneels before the fireplace and fills it as much as it’ll hold, to keep Zelda warm for as long as she can. “I don’t know why you insist on doing it this way every time,” Zelda mutters softly as she kneels beside her, the blanket wrapped around her brushing against Mary’s skin. She whispers the incantation and immediately the fireplace erupts in flames, casting them both in its golden, orange glow. “There.” Zelda finishes, before rising and moving away.  
“Who was her father?” Lilith asks, still facing the flames, letting the heat wash over her, she was colder than she realized. She feels her skin warm slowly, the gentle burn just uncomfortable enough to be pleasant, to keep her grounded in this body, in this moment with Zelda when every fibre of being screamed to run. “Have you ever had children?” Zelda asks from somewhere behind her.  
“I have been a mother figure of sorts,” Lilith begins, hedging her answer, “But I’ve never had children.”  
“Did you ever want any?”  
“Not particularly, no.”  
“It’s all I ever wanted. It was my duty to my family, and the Dark Lord, but I wanted it, I **wanted** her.”

A loud BANG of thunder strikes nearby, rattling the windows of the cottage, but neither of them startles at the sound.

“Do you want to talk about it, Zelda? Or do you want to ignore it?” Lilith asks, turning to face the other woman who is now on the couch, blanket wrapped around her. “I don’t quite know with you humans sometimes.” She admits.  
“Neither do I,” Zelda agrees, wrapping the blanket tighter around her shoulders.

So they sit and wait.

Lilith is thankful she stayed seated on the floor before the fireplace, which keeps her warm, despite Zelda’s earlier comment, she does get cold. She also gets bored, as she is now, but she knows this isn’t the time to admit that. Odd, that’s never stopped her before, but here she is, biting her tongue and listening to the crackle of the fire and the wind blow outside. 

“Edward wasn’t the first Spellman to love a mortal,” Zelda finally begins, making sure her eyes avoid Mary’s in a practiced air of nonchalance.

She’s never said these words. Not all of them, not even some of them. Her life just happened, and then it was over and no one, not Vesta or Virgil Spellman, not Edward, not even her beloved Hilda - try as she may coax it out of her - ever heard it.

“There’s nothing you can say to shock me, Zelda. Or surprise me.” Lilith counters, not kindly, but matter-of-factly. “Within these walls, you can say anything you want. Or nothing. Consider it a confessional of sorts.”  
“That’s blasphemy.”  
“For where two or three gather in my name…”  
“And who’s name are we gathered in? Certainly not yours, **Mary**.”  
“Certainly not mine.” Lilith agrees.  
“Perhaps tonight we gather in Lilith’s name?” Zelda wonders, half to herself. “He loved the name. He loved her.”  
“Did he know who she was named after?”  
“Not entirely. He thought it was a Saint the Spellmans were particularly fond of.”  
“Tell me about him. Did he know what you were?”  
“Not…all of it. Not all of me,” Zelda admits, “But enough. Some I was able to pass off as ‘foreign’ customs, and some he just knew wasn’t **right** , but he didn’t dare ask.”  
“And he was a mortal?”  
“A solder. Levi.”  
“And how did you meet Levi? I can’t imagine a mortal and a witch would have many opportunities for crossed paths?”  
“No, but it was almost by fate”  
“Fate?” Lilith gently chides, “Zelda, that doesn’t sound like you.”  
“I was a very different person then. I doubt you’d have liked me back then.”  
“Who says I like you now?” Lilith asks, adding something familiar to their uncomfortable new dynamic.  
“I was eager and reckless and -”  
“Young.” Lilith finishes.  
“Yes,” She raises her eyes and meets Mary’s, “I was. Were you ever young?”  
“Me? No, I was hatched fully formed.”  
“I would believe it.”  
“Would I lie to you?”  
“Yes.”  
“No.” Lilith corrects, “I would omit, but never lie.”  
“A lie of omission is still a lie.” Zelda chides, “But still, I suppose I can’t expect honesty when dealing with a demon, can I?”  
“You can,” Lilith drawls, “But it would be foolish.”

The glass window panes shake in the blowing wind.

“I think that’s enough bloodletting for one night, don’t you?” Zelda asks.  
“If you insist. This was your game after all.”  
“Hardly a game.” She answers.  
“Is there room under your blanket for me?” Lilith counters.  
“Not at all.” Zelda huffs with an impressive deadpan.  
“Why…” She begins, hesitating, but unable to stop herself, “Why keep the memories?”

The room goes still.

“You mean wipe them from my mind?” A frown crosses Zelda’s brow as she tries to clarify the question.  
“Wouldn’t you be happier?”  
“Is there something wrong with the way I am now?” Her voice turns icy and still.  
“Absolutely not, Satan himself couldn’t have crafted a more devoted, more perfect creature.” Lilith flatters, hoping to calm the witch before her. “But why keep that pain?”

Zelda looks at Mary so hard and so piercingly, Lilith is convinced she can see the truth in her, beneath her.

“I have to remind myself you’re not human.”  
“I’m not.”  
“Do you feel?” Zelda asks, tucking her legs up on the couch. “As we do. Do you feel?”  
“I feel” Lilith begins slowly, uncertain how much to reveal, both to Zelda and herself. “Many things, but it’s been so long since I felt…what humans might.”

Zelda mulls over this for a moment.

“I keep the pain because that’s all I have left.” She finally answers, daring the other being to challenge her. “It’s the only way I can keep them with me and remember them.”  
“And if you didn’t remember them?” Lilith is genuinely curious now, not just about Zelda, but about this aspect of humanity that she has lost touch with centuries ago.  
“If I forgot them, it meant it was all…meaningless. If I forgot them, what would it say about my love? My devotion? It’s all an extension of my love and devotion to the Dark Lord. He gave them to me, and he took them away to teach me and remind me. Without the pain, I would forget the Dark Lord’s message.”  
“I see.” Lilith nods, trying hard not to roll her eyes and disillusion Zelda of her impression of their Lord and Saviour.  
“No, you don’t.” Zelda laughs, brittle and cold.  
“No, I don’t.” Lilith agrees as she rises. “Come on.”  
“Where are we going?”  
“To bed.”  
“I don’t -”  
“To sleep.” Lilith continues, smirking down at where Zelda still sat on the couch. “I’m cold, and I’m tired, and I’ve performed some impressive feats of magic and deserve a nap at the very least, don’t you think?” She asks, walking away.  
“You call what you did impressive?” Zelda snipes back, a ghost of a smile breaking through despite her best efforts. She rises and begins to follows Mary into the bedroom. “Better than what you could’ve done.”

And that’s the last thing Zelda remembers before everything goes black.

Lilith struggles as she brings the sheets and pillows into some semblance of order. She doesn’t know why she’s trying, or what exactly it is she’s trying to do, but still, she does it. The idea of rest, of climbing into the newly made bed, and lying there, just being after the heaviness of the evening sounds surprisingly blissful. “Zelda, are you coming with my blanket, or do I have to drag it and you in here?” Lilith calls out, when she feels hands on her hips, on her belly. Immediately her hackles raise, they’re Zelda’s hands, she can see them, but they aren’t Zelda’s. They no longer belong to Zelda. She feels the other body press against her, a wet mouth finding her ear, “Hello Lilith.” 

Her heart drops, only to be followed by the rest of her body as she’s shoved roughly down onto her knees. She scrambles around and looks up to see the Dark Lord, wearing Zelda’s body like it’s no more than a fur coat. The irony of her own situation doesn’t occur to her - all she can think about is rage. Not for her, she’s used to it, she expects it. No, she’s full of rage that she didn’t see this, see him coming. As for seeing him possess Zelda’s body, there isn’t a word for the darkness and confusion that fills her at that thought. She holds back the bile rising from her belly and twists her mouth into a smile. “Dark Lord,” She greets him, her voice rising sweetly, the way he always liked it.  
“Ah, so you remember me,” He chides, offering Zelda’s hand out. There is a particular gruesomeness to watching Zelda’s mouth grin, eyes light up, as a kneeling Lilith rises slightly to kiss her hand. Had Zelda been herself, she would be delighted at the sight, at the act - but this is not Zelda, no matter how much it looked like her. Smelled like her. “I was worried you’d have forgotten.” He rakes Zelda’s hand through Lilith’s hair and yanks back. There is a roughness that is different, crueller than any action that ever existed between these two bodies. “Could you forget me, Lilith?”  
“Never, Dark Lord.”  
“Never is correct, Lilith. Because wherever you go, there I am.”  
“You are everything, Dark Lord.”  
“I am. And now I am this body.” He drops the blanket and watches as Lilith’s face doesn’t move a muscle. “There, is that better? You seem to like this human, don’t you?”  
“A plaything.” She lies. She knows she cannot turn her head away, but to see Zelda nude like this seems wrong, somehow.  
“A plaything? Did I send you up here to play, Lilith?”  
“No.”  
“I sent you to work, to get me the soul of Sabrina Spellman.”  
“And I did, Dark Lord, she signed the book, she is bound to you.”  
“There is spirit and there is letter - she is bound by letter, but her spirit, her soul, that isn’t mine. And rather than serving me, which is your dark and divine purpose, you…come up here and what? Devote yourself to this… Witch? Lilith, you are my dearest, most beloved **pet** ,” Zelda’s hand gently caresses the side of Lilith’s face, before chucking her chin upwards and holding her face in place. “What made you think you were worthy of one of your own? Did you think you deserve such distractions? Hmmm?”

She looks at him possessing Zelda, and for an endless moment, all she can see is the body of Zelda Spellman that she has spent hours devouring and delighting. And then he shifts her head, and it breaks the illusion - it’s wrong and it’s unnatural and it’s vile. 

Evil.

The thought breaks through her mind and creates a small crack that grows bigger and bigger until Lilith forces her mind to see him. See him as he really is, his giant frame, his hairy haunches and hooves, his horns and snarling snout. There was a time, long ago, but not too long to have forgotten, where Lucifer Morningstar was the most beautiful creature to have ever existed on the planet. His voice was like a cat’s purr, low and warm and enticing, wrapping her up in its safety, in its love. It was everything. He was everything. He was her everything. She still remembers him as he was, before Hell broke his bones, his skin until his body shifted slowly, year by year and took on that animalistic form. And still, she loved him. Still, she saw him as the most beautiful, the most divine of beings. She drives her mind to see him like this, once more, to wipe away the thought that he is using Zelda’s body, that he could do whatever he wants to the frail being - break the bones as if they were twigs, tear the flesh as if it were spider webs. She remembers when he once loved her, when he once was kind to her. She remembers, and she will make him remember too. She will bend her body the ways he liked, and soften her voice, her eyes - she will be admiration and adoration and honey and gentleness. Everything and everything he wants to make sure Zelda survives this. 

“It’s cold,” He says, turning and walking out the room towards the living room, towards the fire which roars back to life, aware of who is in control. Who is always in control. Lilith rises up off the floor and races swiftly behind them. She finds them seated on the couch once more, and it all but gives her whiplash at the thought that it had been just moments since they were here. “Have a seat,” He commands, eyes hard and watching. “So you **do** remember your place Lilith, I had begun to wonder.” He lights up Zelda’s face with his delight at seeing her settle on the floor before him.  
“I always know my place before you my Dark Lord.” She replies softly, gently - her nails digging into the flesh of her thighs.  
“I wondered.”  
“Does it bother you, Lilith? To see your pastime like this?”  
“Not particularly.” She forces her hands to relax, her breath to slow down.  
“No?”  
“No - it’s an honour for any witch to be in your presence.”  
“It is. And Zelda is a most devout witch, isn’t she?”  
“Indeed. If she were to know, she would feel most favoured.”  
“I liked them at one point, the Spellmans. They went back, oh - eons. Do they still have the Cain Pit?”  
“I believe so.” She lowers her chin and widens her eyes, every part of her body soft and demure. 

Pleasing.

“It all went wrong with Edward. And then that baptism business with the other one. So much wasted power.”  
“Mmmm.” She wordlessly agrees.  
“But you like this one. Why?”  
“Her body has its uses.” She shrugs. She cannot lie, she cannot insult the Prince of Darkness by using a language he has created in front of him. He would see it and smell it before the words leave her mouth.  
“It must if she’s stolen your affections from me. Your devotion.”  
“Never, Dark Lord.”  
“Then why go against me? Why grant her her powers back? Why challenge me?”  
“Challenge?”  
“If I see it fit to strip anyone of their powers Lilith, and I mean **anyone** , it’s my divine right, isn’t it?”  
“I’m sorry my Lord.” She twists her voice until it shakes, she trembles her lip and wills her eyes to water. “I thought it was Faustu-”  
“That man could no more strip anyone of their powers than you could rule Hell Lilith.” He takes particular pleasure with that statement.  
“I just thought-”  
“You aren’t here to think,” Lucifer begins, rising, and wandering about the room, “You’re here to do my bidding and my will, do you understand?” He stops at the desk and rifles through with an air of boredom. “What is it that you do up here again?”  
“Teach.”  
“You and children?” He laughs as he picks up a letter opener. “I have plans for this body. For Zelda, do you understand?” He turns to face the still kneeling Lilith.  
“Plans?”  
“Yes. Now, it would be merciful for you to let what is going to happen, happen. It would, in fact, be in everyone’s best interest.” The letter opener gleams in the firelight - it is now somehow sharper than before. The threat of it is unspoken but understood. “Zelda has stolen your attention, your devotion from me. No- ” He holds a hand up to stop her arguing, “It’s true. She has stolen from me and the price of that must be paid in blood, either hers or yours. What an honour it would be for her to die at the hand of her Lord.” He smiles at the thought then drops the letter opener to the ground as he moves towards her. He motions with two fingers to rise, and so she does, standing close enough to smell his sulphur smell instead of her ashes and whiskey. “I wonder,” He asks, leaning close enough to close the gap, “Who’s name would you call out?” He kisses her - rough and hard and graceless - and as much as Lilith wants to struggle, she can’t. Her body knows Zelda’s and reacts on some small level to it and her mind encourages it - anything to make it through this moment, anything to make sure they both come out safe. 

Anything. 

She’ll give him anything and so he takes it.  


* * *

  
When Zelda wakes, it’s in an unfamiliar bed. It’s empty and cold. She rises quickly, senses slowly but surely firing up. Mary’s room, she’s in Mary’s room. She doesn’t remember how, she doesn’t remember much. She takes stock of what she knows: She’s in Mary’s room, she’s alone, it’s morning. Her hand reaches out to the table where they land on her cigarettes, her lighter. She releases the breath she was holding and lights up - everything becomes easier to deal with once the nicotine clears away the fog - except the fog isn’t clearing. She gets out of the bed and hesitates for a moment before she magics the bed into fixing itself. Her powers are back, that’s another thing to add to the list of what she knows. She applies a quick glamour before she goes out in search of Mary. She’s not in the living room (where she grabs a throw and wraps it around her body - her nudity somehow feeling entirely too vulnerable at this moment), or the bathroom, but the front door is ajar and so she opens it further to find her sitting on the steps, dressed in her robe, her thumbnail tapping her front teeth with worry. “Didn’t you get any sleep?” She asks softly.  
“I don’t need much.” 

Neither of them looks at the other, both training their eyes towards the tree-line.

“What happened last night?”  
“Nothing good.”  
“Mary.”  
“Zelda, you should leave.”  
“Leave?”  
“We both did something incredibly stupid last night -”  
“What did we do? I remember coming to you, and you restoring my powers, and then…nothing. What happened?”  
“That’s it. That’s all that happened.”  
“Then why do I have to leave?”  
“Zelda, I’m a demon.”  
“Yes, and? Do you think you’re the first demon I’ve tangled with?” She scoffs playfully, trying to lighten the heaviness in the air.  
“No, but I might just be the dumbest.”  
“I see.” Zelda’s voice grows cold and hard and she rises and returns to the cottage.

What Lilith wants to say is she’s sorry for what happened last night. She wants to plead for forgiveness, but can’t even express or confess to her crime, her violation. What she wants to say is she could get her killed - will get her killed. That she would protect her if she could, but she can’t. She has spent the rest of the night since Satan’s departure on the front porch thinking thinking thinking. Her mind and her heart racing. But she can’t say these things, because she doesn’t have the words, doesn’t have the power. She is drowning in her thoughts, in her terror over last night, in her rage at herself. How could she let this happen? How could she be dumb enough to think the Dark Lord wouldn’t see her returning Zelda’s powers as a challenge? How could she find herself so far from the Dark Lord’s darkness that she can see him - her vision clearing for the first time since her rebirth. There are too many thoughts in her mind, too many possibilities and outcomes, and almost each and every one of them leads to their death (if they’re lucky). 

There’s only one way out and she doesn’t dare think about it, the thought alone being enough to get her tried and found guilty of treason in the Low Courts of Hell. Still…

She has so much to say and not enough words or courage to say them, so she watches as a clothed Zelda walks past her, down the stairs. She watches as Zelda glares at her before getting into the hearse and driving away. She watches as the hearse disappears down the road, and then she rises and takes a deep breath and proceeds to vomit over the side of the railing.  


* * *

  
Zelda’s heart drops even lower as she pulls up to the house. She cannot keep lying to them, sneaking in, heartbroken. 

Her stomach twists at the thought. 

She’s not heartbroken, no. To have anything more than lust and attraction to the demon, impossible. No, she steels herself enough to keep the tears in, she hasn’t had her heart broken, she's barely had it bruised. She takes a deep breath and exits the car - as she raises her head she sees Hilda already on the porch, waiting for her, arms ready to comfort her, shield her. Provide her with more solace and love than she deserves. “Oh Zelds,” She sighs, ready to take her sister in, but Zelda simply pushes past her and races upstairs to her room, her hands roughly wiping away the tears that found their way onto her face. 

No. She is Zelda fucking Spellman and she is better than this, she is stronger than this and it’s time to start acting like it.  


* * *

  
  


  
The difference between Despair  
And Fear—is like the One  
Between the instant of a Wreck  
And when the Wreck has been—  
Emily Dickinson

  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **AN2:** Uh, so, hi *waves*. I’m sorry I’ve been gone for so long. One morning I woke up and I couldn’t write. A word. Not a line in my journal. Not a line for this. Not on my scripts. Nothing (Ironically, it happened right after I had written about Zelda being stripped of her powers). I tried everything (including therapy), but nothing worked, so we had to just wait it out… Apparently, no matter how hard you try to ignore, repress, bypass and disassociate from your issues, you will eventually have to work them out. Anyways - thank you so much to everyone (and I mean **_everyone_** ) who messaged me, re-read, re-commented, and generally just sent out good thoughts, kindness, and concern. There are no words for how much it meant to me. Truly. <3 <3 <3
> 
>  
> 
> **AN3:** In re-reading/editing the chapter, I realize I stole an exchange from Moonstruck, and I’m ok with that. The title comes from a line from ‘Needed’ by Rhye. My notes say there’s a ‘The Lady Eve’ reference in here as well, but I’m not quite sure if it survived the cut?
> 
>  
> 
> **AN4:** The incantation used roughly translates to:  
> I unbind you  
> And I strengthen your might
> 
> I protect you  
> And I bless you with light
> 
>    
>  **AN5:** Because it goes without saying, but I'mma say it anyways - I hope you and your loved ones are safe and healthy. Wash your hands, cover your sneezes, take your vitamins (idk), and I hope we all pass through this safely.


	8. I Feel It Coming

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> She sits with this feeling, this question, and tries to categorise it, tries to compare it to every other emotion and experience she’s had in her long, illustrious life as the Mother of Demons but she comes up empty, as if the answer is on the tip of her tongue, but never quite formed enough for her lips to wrap around, for her teeth to sink into.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **AN1:** There’s a fair number of cuss words (the horror!) and an act of violence which leads to the death of a demon.  
>  **AN2:** There’s potential triggers to incest (in as much as Satan is Sabrina’s father) and sexual abuse of that nature towards the end, but nothing graphic.

  


* * *

  
The last thing Zelda expected to see when she entered her house was to see Mary Wardwell making herself at home at the kitchen table. Not tonight. She had half a mind to turn around and return to the Academy, or the woods before any of them saw her. She didn’t have the mind to deal with her right now, let alone the energy that woman took from her.

If she had her way, she would never see that wretched woman ever again. Perhaps soon enough, she’d have her way. 

This is the thought that she firmly holds on to as she takes off her black shawl and hangs it. As she greets her family (and her family only), as she climbs up the stairs towards her room to change. She imagines a life without Mary Wardwell as she sheds her blouse and skirt for something more appropriate for home. She imagines the peace of sleeping through the night. Of having her dreams be her own once more as she adjusts her hair and reapplies her lipstick. She imagines what would’ve happened had Levi never died as she fingers the delicate chain of the new necklace that is hiding beneath the collar of her blouse. It hangs heavy around her neck and it makes her hyper-aware of every time it moves against her skin. She does not imagine what it would be like to bury herself in Mary’s arms, her hair, her blankets and her bed until everyone forgets what they wanted from her (they all seem to want so much at times), forgets she existed. She certainly doesn’t imagine what her life would be like if she could have her way once more. She tried that once, happiness, and paid heavily for the price. 

Freedom and joy are for the young who are too foolish to know what they’re getting themselves into. Only the young are able to enter into _that_ Faustian bargain wholeheartedly.

Faustus.

She finds herself raking her hands through her hair and pulling it back, examining her face in the mirror - there are hints of dark circles now that the day’s glamour is wearing off, and just lines all over her face, lines that she doesn’t remember being there before (and Satan, was there a before)? She felt old. She felt tired. She felt unsettled and on edge, and clearly it’s Mary’s fault. She doesn’t know why she allows that nobody of a demon to do this to her, she really doesn’t, she thinks to herself as she lets her hair fall back down and shakes it back into shape. 

She smiles tightly at herself in the mirror. She can get through this, she can. She can be polite and distant and disinterested in the other woman until it’s time for her to leave. She can act as if the days they hadn’t seen each other were years as if she didn’t even remember the other woman’s name (let alone how she sounded burying a scream into the crook of her neck). She can be everything Vesta Spellman had raised her to be. _Everything_.

Had it really only been days since she had her powers stripped and restored, she wonders as she descends the stairs. It seemed so much longer. 

She steels herself as she enters the kitchen, tries not to notice Mary’s eyes following her as she greets her sister, and tastes the gravy simmering on the stove. She tries to ignore them as she makes a stiff drink for herself before pulling out the dinner dishes. She tries to ignore everything about this woman, who has made it clear that she wants nothing to do with her. Which is fine, she thinks to herself, gathering up cutlery and napkins, as she wants even less to do with her. She’s never trusted her, let alone liked her, and if it wasn’t for her surprisingly adept handiwork, she would’ve never slept with her. 

Still, she can feel those eyes watching her, can’t she? She isn’t sure, but every time she tries to catch Mary looking at her so she can tell her off, she fails, the other woman’s head piously bowed over the books with Sabrina. The whole thing sets her teeth on edge, Mary being here, Mary tutoring her niece, Mary not looking at her but still … staring at her. If not with her eyes, then with her… She doesn’t know, but she swears she can feel the other woman’s attention on her. She has received it so often before that she doesn’t think she could ever forget what that feels like, like a bird hypnotized by a snake about to strike. That’s exactly what she must be out of her human form, Zelda thinks to herself, a demonic snake who - “Aunt Zelda? Auuunnt Zelda?” - Sabrina’s sing-song finally snaps her back to the kitchen, standing by the table, a stack of plates held firmly in her white-knuckled grip.  
“Yes, sorry dear?”  
“Did you want to move out of the way?”  
“If you wouldn’t mind.”  
“I suppose I should be going, wouldn’t want to intrude on your dinner time?” Mary offers up so earnestly it could only be to antagonize her.  
“When has being where you’re not wanted ever stopped you?” Zelda snipes as she begins to drop plates in places.  
“In that case,” Mary grins up at her, taking a plate from her hands, “I’d love to stay.”  
“Lovely,” She drawls, “Then you can finish setting the table.” Zelda thrusts the remaining plates towards the other woman before settling down at the counter and taking a long, necessary sip of her drink. “Sabrina, please show Mary where the forks and knives are?”  
“Promise not to stab each other with them?” Sabrina offers up sweetly. It’s not often someone manages to rile her Aunt Zelda like Mary Wardwell somehow does, and it’s a little fun if she’s honest. Her whole life, her Aunt Zelda had been the strongest, the smartest, and yes, at times, the meanest until her Dark Baptism rolled around. That changed everything for her. That’s what opened her eyes not only to the world around her, but to their standing in their congregation and their necessary sublimation as a family unit, and as a family of (mostly) women. Until then, she hadn’t realized that they were on their own without the protection of Edward or Virgil Spellman, who were not only High Priests but more importantly, men. 

Personally, Sabrina never saw the issue with their outsider standing in the Church, Aunt Hilda had been excommunicated and she was fine, but she could also tell there was something she didn’t quite see or know about everything. If she didn’t have so many other concerns in her life, she’d care a great deal more, but as it is, what with being haunted by demons and ghosts and college entrance essays, she pushes it aside, she can only deal with so much at any given time. But now, more often than not, when she sees her Aunt Zelda, she’s… Different. Now she folds the sharp edges of her tongue and her personality into herself as she smiles at and flirts with Father Blackwood (the thought alone is gross enough to make her want to barf). Both her aunts remind her that everything Zelda does is for this family, but none of them can ever quite answer why she has to do _that_? No, Sabrina thinks to herself as she helps Ms. Wardwell set the table, she much rather prefers her Aunt like this, a little snarky, a little mean, a little defensive, and very much herself. 

With the table set, they settle themselves around the table, “No Ambrose tonight?”  
“He’s studying late, but he’ll be back in time.” Sabrina answers.  
“We’ll fix him a plate, don’t worry Zelds.”  
“It’s hard not to, with the two of them Hilda,” Zelda answers, casting an eye over their niece.  
“I resent that Auntie Zee. I haven’t gotten into like, any major demonic, or satanic issues in like, months.”  
“You’re absolutely right Sabrina, and for that, let us thank Satan.” She smirks as she offers her hands out to Sabrina on one side, and Mary on the other for a brief prayer of thanks before the meal begins.

Normally Zelda finds there to be entirely too much chatter at mealtimes. Growing up meal times were silent, or near-silent, with Mother and Father asking the occasional disinterested question of their children. Even after Zelda’s return to Greendale as a widow and a woman, meals were still solemn affairs. In fact, it wasn’t until Sabrina and Ambrose came to them did they devolve into babble and chatter, despite Zelda’s best and earlier efforts to keep it in check. Right now though, she is rather grateful to Hilda and Sabrina for occupying Mary with what sounds like an endless stream of nonsense, leaving her to nurse her drink and push around the food on her plate, her appetite gone. It will be hard to imagine dinners in the future but she suspects they’ll very much be like the dinners of her youth. She checks her watch every few minutes, certain it’s been hours, only to be disappointed every time. “Somewhere you need to be, Zelda?” Mary asks casually after catching her. “I’d hate to think we were keeping you from something?”  
“What could be more important than my family?” Zelda lobs back, “And their… _guests_?”  
“It’s just that you keep looking at your watch,” Hilda explains.  
“And you’ve hardly touched your food.” Sabrina chimes in.  
“And it’s one of your favourites, isn’t it?” Hilda continues, worried about her sister.  
“How kind of you all to pay such attention.” Zelda grits out through a smile before heaping her fork with food and moving it into her mouth. She couldn’t even tell you what it was, or what it tasted like, only that she chewed it and swallowed it, washing it down with the last of her drink. 

This is ridiculous, she thinks to herself, running her finger around the rim of her empty glass. This is her house, this is her family, and Mary Wardwell seems to think she can come in and dine with them? And charm them? After what she did to Zelda? Absolutely not. And why were they laughing with her, and talking to her like that? She fumes behind a mask of polite disinterest, the edges of her mouth curled ever so slightly up the way Vesta had taught her years and years ago. She wishes she could do more, but ever since she awoke in Mary’s bed alone the other morning, there’s an unease that never leaves her, like a second skin. It wraps around her and keeps her company when she’s alone in her room, or when she’s teaching her students, it tightens its grip around her when she’s with Faustus. It’s a seed of wrongness in the pit of her belly that has grown tendrils that have wrapped themselves around her stomach and lungs and heart and throat. She’s asked Hilda to examine her for curses and spells, but there was nothing either sister could find to explain it. Hilda asked what she could remember, but Zelda remembers nothing other than Mary telling her to leave and she cannot tell Hilda that, so she tells her nothing.

She always tells Hilda nothing.

And suddenly, there’s Mary, standing at her side, asking if she can take her plate. Zelda barely gives her a glance, she can feel the other woman as she gives her a thorough exam, making sure everything is as it should be, but Zelda can’t be bothered to return it. “No,” She answers, rising up, “I’m saving it for Tom."  
“The dead dog?”  
“What is your fixation with him?” She argues as she scrapes the remnants of it into his bowl.  
“I’m not the one with an unhealthy attachment to a dead dog.”  
“Sabrina dear, take your books up, will you?” Hilda asks, laughing nervously, ushering her niece away from the two women, “And then come help me pick out a movie?”  
“Movie?” Mary asks, “My, how wholesome.”  
“Give me those,” Zelda mutters, taking the stack of plates from Mary’s hands, careful not to touch her.  
“Oh yes, it’s movie night! We’ve done this almost every Thursday as long as I can remember.” Hilda explains, “You two finish _whatever_ is happening here and then join us, won’t you?” She commands firmly with a smile before she leaves, leaving Lilith and Zelda together.

“People underestimate Hilda, don’t they?” Lilith asks as she begins to scrape the plates clean and stack them.  
“At their peril.” Zelda points out as she wraps an apron around her waist and ties it back. 

The room is silent save for the sound of water from the faucet, the splash of soap…and a dog chewing? Lilith looks about but can’t find the source of it.

“You underestimate her as well, don’t you?” Lilith asks, before passing over the pile of them to a waiting Zelda at the sink.“Why are you here?” Zelda asks, half-relived  
she was able to finally able to ask what she’s wanted to know all dinner long, and half-humiliated at herself for showing weakness, for needing, for wanting anything from the other woman. “What do you mean?” Lilith asks, twisting her face into a very good approximation of innocence as she holds Zelda’s gaze. “You’re getting yourself wet.” She interjects after a moment, seeing the water overflowing from the sink.  
“Damn it,” Zelda mutters, slamming the tap shut and wiping herself and the counter up with a tea towel. “This is what I mean, why are you here? In my kitchen?”  
“Because Sabrina asked me for help.”  
“We’re perfectly capable of helping her.”  
“I don’t doubt it, Zelda. You and Hilda have done an exemplary job with her.”  
“But…?”  
“No but.” Lilith shrugs as she hops up to sit on the counter as if she belongs here, in this house. “You have.”  
“Then why are you here?” Zelda repeats as she angrily attacks the dishes in front of her.  
“Why shouldn’t I be?”  
“Perhaps because you all but kicked me out the other night as if I was nothing more than a nuisance .”  
“Ah, as I recall, we were already out of the cottage. How are you feeling after that?”  
“After being kicked out? Like I could cheerfully flay you alive and relish every last minute of it.”  
“Stop,” Lilith drawls, grinning at her and clasping a hand where Mary’s heart should be, “You have no idea what it does to me to hear you talk like that.”  
“I don’t have any idea what _anything_ does to you.” Zelda offers up.  
“Don’t exaggerate, you know exactly what you do to me,” Lilith argues. “Besides, does it matter?”  
“No, I suppose not. You simply exist as a message from the Dark Lord.”

Lilith’s stomach drops and her face contorts into measured horror.

“And just what message are you receiving from the Dark Lord?”  
“To be thankful to the Dark Lord for bringing Father Blackwood back into my life.”  
“And your bed?” Lilith asks, legs lightly swinging and kicking against the cabinets beneath her, her nervous energy working itself out of her. “Does he make you call him Father there too?” She laughs, but it’s empty and just a little jealous, “Even his kinks are underwhelming, aren’t they? You can tell me, it’s just us girls here.” Her smile widens and her eyes gleam as she watches Zelda react by setting her jaw and grabbing a large, wet knife - “Aunt Hilda wants to know if you two are almost done?” Sabrina asks, leaning into the kitchen.  
“We’ll be right there,” Zelda answers, her knuckles turning white on the handle of the knife.  
“‘Kay. Um… Aunt Zelda, is that a knife?” Sabrina asks nervously.  
“Yes, she was going to stab me with it,” Mary answers, blasé about the whole thing.  
“Flay, actually. I was going to flay you with it.”  
“Well…” Lilith rolls her eyes.  
“Is that because you probably deserved it?” Hilda asks, entering the room and grabbing bowls of popcorn she had made earlier.  
“Me?” Mary asks, mock wounded.  
“Yes, you. Now, hop down from there, what do you think you are, a child? Help Sabrina with the popcorn.”  
“Popcorn?”  
“Popcorn.” Hilda repeats, shoving a large bowl into their guest’s hands, “Through there,” She directs, watching the other woman leave before turning to her big sister.  
“You ok love?”  
“Why wouldn’t I be?”  
“Oh, I don’t know…” She laughs awkwardly. “You, you weren’t really going to stab her, were you? I just… There’s not enough meat on her to make it worthwhile.”  
“Absolutely not Hilda.” Zelda rinses the last dish and turns to dry her hands on her apron towel. “I was going to flay her.”  
“Ah, that’s much better than, isn’t it?” Hilda rolls her eyes before leaving the kitchen.  


* * *

  
“No Boy Spellman tonight?” Lilith asks as she and her popcorn saunter over to the living room where Sabrina is already splayed out on the floor in front of the TV waiting for the others.  
“Ambrose?” Sabrina asks, craning her neck to look up, “He’ll probably come in half-way through, we’ve seen them all like, a million times.” Sabrina watches as Mary looks around the room, running a buttery finger along the edges of pictures and shelves until she pauses at the window, where something catches her eye. No, not something, someone.  
“Ms. Wardwell?” She asks, “Ms. Waaaaardwellllllll?”  
“Sorry, Sabrina?”  
“Everything ok?” She asks, rising up to look out the window, only to have her teacher draw the curtains on the outside. “You look like you saw a ghost.”  
“A ghost, no?” She nervously titters, “Just a chill.”  
“A chill?” Hilda laughs, “Someone must’ve walked over your grave.”  
“You don’t really believe that, do you, Aunt Hilda?”  
“Of course I do, why do you think I keep asking you and Ambrose to walk the long way around the patch out front?” Hilda hands a bowl to Sabrina before she settles on the wingback and pulls out her knitting. “Now, what are we watching tonight?”  
“I don’t know, it’s your Aunt Zelda’s choice.”  
“Auntie Zee?” Sabrina yells out, “What did you want to watch?!”  
“No need to yell child, I’m right here.” Zelda scolds, walking in with a stiff drink in lieu of popcorn. “I’m feeling something Bergman, surprise me?”  
“Traditionally, doesn’t the guest get to choose?” Lilith asks, settling down on the couch.  
“Traditionally, isn’t a guest invited?” Zelda snipes with a cold smile before turning to stand before Hilda, “My seat?”  
“Oh, but the light is so much better for my knitting Zelda,” Hilda responds, “And I swore I’d have this little set ready.” She holds up the pink sleeves of a tiny knitted sweater. Lilith munches on her popcorn as she watches as the sisters begin and end a wordless, but angry conversation which Zelda ends up either losing or conceding to, before she makes it to the other side of Lilith’s couch. “Ready?” Sabrina asks.  
“Absolutely,” Lilith answers, as she magically lowers the lights and the film begins.

It wasn’t a bad film if she was honest - better than she thought it’d be, given it was in black and white. Ingrid Bergman played a spy in love with her moody handler and is married off to her target. She chooses to ignore certain parallels, the putting on of different personas, the cruelty of all parties involved. Rather, she shifts focus every so often to the now curtained windows - she knows he wouldn’t come in, can’t, but it still makes her uneasy. There’s something about this whole affair that unsettles her, it’s not just for what and who is waiting for her outside, but the way the family swoons at and mouthes along with the film they’ve seen so many times before and the way Zelda curls her legs up on the large space between where they sit on opposite ends of the sofa. It’s so banal and so pedestrian it makes her skin crawl, but she chooses to stay, to watch, and to get caught up in it, even though she doesn’t understand why she wants the heroine to live. There’s such a complete foreignness to the experience that she can’t help but marvel at it - is this what it would be like had she stayed with Adam? What it could’ve been like had she been worthy enough for the Dark Lord? Sitting on a sofa in his Dark Kingdom? The image alone makes her want to laugh. No, Lilith thinks to herself as she looks around to her hosts, it was all a state beings like her can only visit, people like her didn’t qualify for this sort of life, it wasn’t made for them. 

Her thoughts are interrupted by the arrival of Boy Spellman, noisily slurping on some cereal, sitting at his Aunt Hilda’s feet. She watches as he nudges a prone Sabrina’s legs with his feet, grinning at her with a milky mouth when she turns to tell him off, only to have her burst out laughing. There’s an odd tenderness she feels towards them, all of them, at this moment: Hilda, keeping a watchful eye on everyone and everything without ever looking up from her knitting; the younger Spellmans, practically vibrating with unchecked, youthful power and hope that only children can have. She turns slightly to her left and feels tenderness twist into something larger and more painful as she takes in Zelda, curled on her side and dozing in the safety and warmth of her family. She tries to name what she feels beyond tenderness, beyond envy, but she doesn’t have the reference for comparing it, for naming it. She sits with this feeling, this question, and tries to categorize it, tries to compare it to every other emotion and experience she’s had in her long, illustrious life as the Mother of Demons but she comes up empty, as if the answer is on the tip of her tongue, but never quite formed enough for her lips to wrap around, for her teeth to sink into. Instinctively, Lilith leans over to take the half-finished drink dangling from her hand and places it on the floor before returning to her own corner. “She hasn’t been sleeping well,” Hilda informs her, her eyes still hovering somewhere between her handiwork and the television screen. “Does she ever?” Lilith asks with a raised brow before turning back to the movie, where the spy realizes she’s been discovered and been poisoned, that she’ll die at the hands of her husband without having admitted to Cary Grant her true feelings. She chooses not to see the look Hilda sends in her direction. She can feel the end creep up on her - both in the film and her time as Mary Wardwell. 

Decisions would have to be made, the sooner the better.  


* * *

  
Zelda slips out of sleep and into confusion and comfort.

She’s not in her bed, and she’s not in Mary’s either. She blinks once or twice but doesn’t move while she gathers her bearings. She’s in the darkened living room, the curtains closed and the television off. There’s someone sitting on the other end of the couch. 

Mary. 

Mary is sitting on the other end of the couch. That explains the weight on her leg. Mary’s hand rests on it, above the blanket that found its way onto her. 

Her eyes have adjusted to the darkness now, and she watches Mary. She feels guilt over this action. She should snatch her leg back, and kick the other woman out. She should not be here. She should not want her to be here. Satan forgive her, but she cannot help but watch the other woman, unblinking and pensive. In her sleepy brain, Zelda can imagine this is what poor Medusa must’ve looked like after she turned to stone. Or Lilith, herself. She feels warmth spread from her chest across the whole of her body and she hates herself for allowing herself to feel it. To feel anything but contempt for this creature. She doesn’t know what changed between them the other night, but something did - their barbs and jabs are softer, less direct than ever before but somehow it hurts, even more, when they land. Where they once shared the same breath, the same body, it now felt as if they were being slowly torn apart from each other until they found themselves on opposite ends of an invisible chasm. Lucifer, she’s pathetic. She thinks to herself, rolling her eyes and setting her jaw to keep her eyes from welling up.  
“You’re awake,” Mary says softly from the dark, turning her head to look at her.  
“You’re still here?” Zelda cringes internally at the chill she can hear in her voice, but could not stop it if she wanted to.  
“The movie just ended.” Mary lies, withdrawing her hand from where it gently rested on Zelda’s leg.  
“Well, in that case, good night.” She dismisses her guest.  
“Did you have a good sleep? Hilda says you haven’t been sleeping well.”  
“When do I ever?” Zelda responds, shifting the blanket around, “But yes, now that you asked, I slept…well enough.”  
“Good. I was worried.”  
“You don’t worry about anyone other than yourself Mary, but I assure you, all is well in dreamland.” Again, there’s the bite in her voice. She doesn’t know why it keeps coming up, but it does, an anger at the other woman, but for what, she doesn’t know. She had slowly come to, if not trust (because who could trust a demon?) then at least expect something from Mary, even if that something was to keep the nightmares at bay. 

And now? Nothing.

Not that it matters now, after Faustus. Her hand flies to the chain around her neck as if she didn’t feel the weight of his ring pressing down against her entire being. 

“In that case, I’ll be off.” Mary is uncharacteristically withdrawn, pensive even, and it pleases Zelda to think that her words hurting her, even a little, even superficially. Good. Let her feel something, let her feel anything other than pleasure. Let her feel pain and humiliation and neglect so many other emotions that are so primitive and raw that they lack names. Let her feel sorrow and regret. Let her feel a drop of what Zelda feels right now and has felt since she was kicked out of Mary’s shack. “You’re still here.” Zelda points out after a moment. It’s too dark to see what Mary’s looking at, but she suspects it’s her - and while she’s used to being looked at and admired and wanted, this is different. This is penitent. This is as if Mary herself feels the fracture between them as if she feels the loss that neither of them can verbalize. 

For Lilith, she can’t help but half look at Zelda and half turn away. There was no glowing, ghostly skin, smooth and milky from glamour and a near-lifetime of living in the woods - no, what she saw was pasty and pale, as if it belonged to someone subsiding on whiskey and cigarettes instead of food and sleep. 

Still, there’s something utterly compelling and beautiful about her.

She wants to apologize to her, but she doesn’t know what she would say. Or how. She’s never apologized to someone who wasn’t Lucifer Morningstar before and meant it.

The taste in her mouth changes turns bitter like bile and she’s now unable to stop herself from turning away. It’s not that she’s forgotten the violation of the other woman’s body and being by Satan himself. No, the thought is always there, lingering in the back of her mind when it’s not at the very forefront of it. It’s more that she hates even thinking about him in front of Zelda, Zelda who doesn’t remember, except for the nightmarish flashes that come to her and keep her awake when she closes her eyes. 

“Well,” Zelda drawls, stretching her arms, “If you’re going to stay here, I’m going to go up to bed. Were you planning on playing guard dog for the night?” 

The question hangs in the dark air between them for a moment. A moment which Zelda spends hating herself and her desperation for asking, the hope evident to both of them. She doesn’t even know why she did it. Still, she waits for Mary’s response.

“I should leave,” Lilith begins, choosing each word carefully, “Pretty sure your family will have plenty to gossip about as it is.”  
“My family doesn’t notice anything beyond their own interests and lives.”  
“Hilda notices everything.”  
“Hilda is different,” Zelda scoffs, “She’s my sister and she wants me to be happy.” Noticing her fumble, Zelda tries to recover, “Besides, she has nothing else to notice.”  
“Do I make you happy?”  
“No, you don’t,” Zelda admits, surprised at both Mary’s question and her own forthright answer. “But then again, nothing really does, so…” She shrugs before flicking a finger to turn the lights on in the room. “That’s better. You were getting so maudlin in the dark.”

She rises from the couch and folds the blanket and places it back where it belongs before she turns to Lilith, “I’ll show you out.” The spell of the near-black room is gone, in the light she feels more sure of herself, of her anger towards the other woman. 

She heads to the foyer and opens the front door and waits for Mary, who follows along a few steps behind, and crosses the threshold. Somehow this feels better, porches seem to be their place, neither in nor out, neither here nor there, neither fully woman, witch, or demon, but some unholy combination. “I didn’t see your car when I came in?” Zelda asks.  
“I walked.”  
“Well then,” Zelda says, shivering as a wind blows past them. “You’re in for a brisk stroll, aren’t you?”  
“It’ll help clear my mind.”  
“From?”

Mary grins wolfishly at her.

Zelda rolls her eyes before disappearing behind the door for a moment, reappearing with a swath of black wool in her hands. “Here,” she offers, stepping into Mary’s space before she drapes it around her neck and shoulders. “What?” She asks, seeing the confusion in the other woman’s eyes.  
“It’s just I seem to recall you wishing death upon me, several times.”  
“I still do,” Zelda shrugs with feigned disinterest, her hand still clutching the ends of the fabric against Mary’s breastbone. “But if you’re to die, it should be by my hand, not happenstance, or a hell forbid, cold. I want to make you suffer and beg for it. I want you to want it as badly as you want me. You wouldn’t deny me this, are you?” She asks, her green eyes gleaming.  
“I’ll deny you nothing,” Lilith admits, the statement slipping out before she can stop it before she can register the honesty of it. She was too busy being mesmerized by the change in the other woman. She doesn’t know why, the change in her moods was as constant as the winds of the sea, but it still amused her and caught her off guard every time. “Now _that_ is a lie worthy enough of the devil himself, Mary.” Zelda softly scolds, stepping even closer to the other body, the other woman.  
“You used to like it when I lied to you.” She asks, unsure if it a lie is or not. She finds herself lightheaded at the sleepy scent of Zelda and places a hand out to steady herself, only to have it land where the nip of Zelda’s waist meets the curve of her hip. There’s a sharpness of blood in the air, and Lilith’s eyes catch a gleam of white tooth burying into soft, pink flesh.

One of them sighs, but neither knows which. They’re too busy just hovering in this moment of stillness that exists between them to try to parse it out. They can either move forward into an embrace or retreat and pull apart, but neither of them is willing to reveal their hand first, so here they stay, in this very small moment of time. It’s not for lack of want, no. Zelda wants nothing more than to have Mary bridge the infinitely small distance between them but refuses to do it herself. It’s too saccharine, too sentimental. For now, it will be enough to feel the warmth of Mary’s hand, the proximity of her being and her breath. It will have to be enough to hear her own heartbeat thudding slowly and loudly in her own ears. To look at Mary looking at her as if she was precious. 

Fear and want radiate off the other woman in heavy, heady waves and while it doesn’t explain, or excuse her childish and idiotic behaviour the other night, for now, it’s enough. It’s enough to know that Mary still wants her, still cares.

And so, Zelda leans forward and bends her head and places a soft and chaste kiss on the other woman’s cheek.

She releases her hold on the black shawl she had placed on Mary’s shoulders and steps back, out of Mary’s reach, her hand contracting at the emptiness of space where there was once flesh. There’s nothing carnal, or sexual about the kiss. Simply a moment of comfort, a thoughtless act of uncharacteristic kindness which drops the bottom out from under them and triggers a deep-seated sense of terror. Kindness and comfort are not the emotions they expressed to or for the other, and certainly not while they were dressed and upright. 

This action upends everything.

This hunger for comfort feels new to Zelda. They’ve never done this before, have they? She can’t remember - somehow it all feels new to her, everything feels wrong after having her power restored back to her, and she hates it. She feels like her soul has been replaced with something similar, but different. She hates that a hand on some warm cotton could impact her like this. That her night may end without a proper kiss, and that she’d be perfectly content to stand in the doorway and share the same air as Mary Wardwell until the end of time. 

She hates it all, and she hates Mary the most.

“You should run away with me,” Mary says, her eyes never leaving Zelda’s face. “What do you say?”  
“I’ll pack my bags.”  
“Good night then.” Lilith smiles softly before she moves her head off to the side and calls out loudly, “Good night Hilda!”  
“Oh, good night dear!” Comes the muffled and mildly embarrassed response from behind them.  
“She was hiding behind the curtains.” Lilith grins and explains.  
“Yes, I gathered. Thank you for explaining my family to me.”  
“Always happy to be of service.”  
“Well.”  
“Well.”

And with that, Zelda turns and goes back into the house, leaving Mary outside, standing in a yellow pool of light.

Inside, Hilda stands by the stairs, hands playing with the dishtowel in her hand, “Zelda, do you want to talk?”, as her sister walks by, she continues, “It can be about anything." Zelda pauses, and for once she doesn’t snipe or snap at her but considers the question being asked. As much as she wants to talk about it with Hilda, she can’t. She doesn’t have the words to explain the hollow emptiness that has spread within her. It’s as if she’s left the most important part of her in Mary’s house - except she can’t tell you which piece, only that it’s missing. She wants to tell her sister of Faustus’ offer. Or her nightmares - different than the whips and the crops - these involve demons, truly terrifying ones who live within her and hold her down. These involve Levi. These come even when she’s awake. When she closes her eyes and sees Satan himself, and when she opens them, he’s still there just around the corner, just under the bed, just in the next room. Just beside her. And while it would be an honour, suddenly, it feels oppressive and heavy. Wrong. Everything feels wrong. She wants to tell Hilda everything, or even anything but finds she can’t. “Good night Hilda.” She answers, before proceeding up the stairs.  
“Do you want me to turn the porch lights off at least?”  
“No, leave them on.” She answers, knowing in her blood that Mary is still standing out there.  


* * *

  
Lilith stands on the porch until she’s certain they’ve gone up. She stands there until Hilda eventually turns off the kitchen light and climb the stairs. Until she can feel Zelda’s eyes grow heavy with sleep, but still she stays awake, praying to Lilith for guidance. For once, she grants her privacy, she doesn’t want to hear, she doesn’t want to know.

Still, Lilith stays on the porch. She focuses on Sirius, she can find it any place and any time, even in daylight - her oldest friend. Has it died yet, she wonders? She remembers seeing it for the first time, her first night out of the garden. She swore it was God, following her, watching her suffer in the cold, barren desert. Every night it would appear and watch her. Just to watch her. It wouldn’t say anything when she shouted out, or cried, or raged. It just hung there. Eventually, she came to see it not as a watchful eye of a vengeful God, but an impartial observer. She began to speak to it, having no one else to speak to. She came to rely on it. The night she met Lucifer, she remembers it shone brighter than it ever did - gleaming like her beloved’s soul. Now she knows better about Sirius, a distant ball of hydrogen and helium, but back then, she could think of nothing more comforting than her twinkling companion. Satan, she hopes it’s dead, and this is the last memories of it, making its way to her. Like Sirius, time and friendship have no meaning for her, as it does for these witches and humans, so she stands and watches the stars float by in the night sky, indifferent to the goings-on in their house. 

When she’s ready for what she suspects comes next, she steps off the safety of the porch, through the wards and blood magic which protect the house, and out towards the forest. Soon, she’s joined by Maury’s demi-demons, scampering on their hands and knees around her, and shortly after by Maury himself. “You smell of these humans Lilith.”  
“Lovely to see you too, Maury. They aren’t humans, they’re witches.”  
“Witches are humans simply prolonging the inevitable. If you are a thing that was born to die, are you not a dead thing, even while you breathe?* A hard shit or soft, it’s still shit.”  
“How philosophical you’ve gotten in your old age.” She grins, pausing to squat down and stokes the two dog-like demons who are tangling themselves around her. “Isn’t he deep?! Isn’t he?” She baby voices to them, their snarling snout faces sniffing her, their bodies jockeying for more pets and scratches. “And what are your names?”  
“You know they don’t have names, Lilith. It doesn’t do to get attached.” 

Neither of them misses the meaning in his words.

“You should name them. It’s bad for them to go through life without names.” She explains, looking up into her companion’s bovine eyes. She can see there’s something serious on his mind. For a moment she wonders if this is it if this is how it ends for her, in the Satan-forsaken woods of Greendale, at the hands of the closest thing she’s had to a friend in millennia. She rises and dusts her knees off before continuing the walk through the darkness. She spots the tree with the swing hanging from it and places her hand on the trunk briefly, letting the magic pass through her, strengthening her before she turns back to face him. “Skippy and Rover. What do you think?” She asks, slapping the side of her thigh, calling them over like they were dogs. “Do you like that? Skippy and Rover?” She laughs as the growl their displeasure. “No, no I guess not.” They continue their way down the path, “What about Spot and Buddy?”  
“Absolutely not.” Maury grimaces.  
“It’s too late. Henceforth they shall be named Spot and Buddy.”  
“I hate you.”  
“No, you don’t.” She beams at him.  
“What are you doing here?”  
“Walking home.”  
“You know what I’m talking about. What are you doing here? What is _He_ doing here? What are any of us doing here?” He  
pauses on their path. She chooses not to answer, or at least that’s what she tells herself. Better that than to admit she doesn’t know anymore. Somehow what was once clear became muddied and tangled like the forest roots at their feet. “We’re both getting too old for all this Lilith, you know that as well as I do, don’t you? The way has been lost…” He lets his words hang in the air, he lets her piece together the implications. And she doesn’t like it when she finally does. “Careful or He may get the wrong idea about you…” She singsongs as she begins to weave through the shadows and the tree branches. There’s no need to specify who ‘He’ was, there could only be one, couldn’t there? “Lilith, come now, this is Maury here…” He begins, his lumbering body keeping pace with her as she swings around the tree trunks like a child. “We both know the truth, don’t we?”  
“And just what is that truth?” She asks, stopping short in front of him, her heart pounding, her eyes red with blood and rage.  
“Must I say it?”  
“You seemed eager not ten seconds ago.”  
“Fine. He doesn’t care. Not about you, not about the Path of Darkness, not the armies of Hell that we once commanded, who grow more tired and more lazy by the century. He has no further use for you, for us, he hasn’t in decades, he likely never will again. ”  
“And you’re saying this as his emissary?”  
“I say this as your compatriot.”  
“And I say that you’re full of shit.” She spits back.  
“You think if you’re quiet if you’re polite if you do what he wants of you when and how he wants to, he’ll look at you like he once did. That he’ll love you as he once did.” He can smell the pheromones indicating fear pouring out of her human skin, but he continues, “That’s no longer Him. That’s no longer within Him to give you, or to give anyone. He only loves power, **his** power, no one else’s. Not yours, not mine, not any of ours.”  
“This is blasphemy and it will get you killed.” She mutters, turning her head away, her jaw set. Rageragerage boils through her real veins, her human suit begins to constrict her. She cannot breathe but would rather suffocate than admit that to Maury. “No one would believe you if you said anything,” He grins coldly at her, his squat little teeth gleaming yellow in the shadows.  
“So, you’ve come to what? To gloat? Fuck you.” She grinds out, her words lost in the growls of the demons at her feet.  
“Gloat? Never!” He pretends to be aghast. “Well, yes, I would, but that’s not why I’m here. I’m here because I’m fucking here. **Here** , Lilith. I’m here in **fucking** Greendale with you, a town we wouldn’t have even stopped to take a shit in a hundred years ago. We used to roam Russia, Mesopotamia, the Antipodes. We used to cross deserts and oceans and jungles. The world was **ours**!” His voice is heavy with longing, and even though she knows it’s traitorous, she can’t help feel what’s left of her self stir at his words. “We used to have gold and gems and virgins and the cries of bleeding sheep and ivory laid at our alters. We used to traverse the Earth and beyond, and now we’re all tied to Greendale like it’s some sort of scared, holy Mecca. For what? To wait around for some child bride?!” Lilith’s ears perk and eyes narrow, “The concubine you’re grooming for him…” He watches her react, and despite her human body, he can still read her like the stars in the sky. “You do **know** just how to please him, don’t you, Lilith? Who else could he turn to for such an important task?” Now **that** , he can’t resist rubbing in her face. He’s a Demon, after all, one of the highest, one of the best. He’s not surprised when Lilith reaches out wordlessly and wraps her hand around the throat of Spot, or Rover, or whatever convoluted name she had just assigned the crawling demons and squeezes it until they whimper, until their larynx collapses in on itself. Until it feels the release of death that has been denied to her. “Do you feel better?” Maruy asks, watching her as she drops the dead carcass to the ground.  
“Never better.” She deadpans. “What do you want, Maury? Why are you telling me this?”

He beams at her, his tiny mouth stretching as wide as it can. 

“I want the world.”  
“You want to die.” She counters, flexing her hand, bothered by its human weakness.  
“Look at us, in Greendale. Greendale of all places, Lilith. Remember when humans cowered in fear of us? They used to be our playthings and toys and now you’re panting after a witch like a bitch in heat, and I’m stuck grunting at cowards like Faustus Blackwood.”  
“Faustus?” Her interest now overrides her fear.  
“Yes. Very foolish of you to go after him, though I have to say, I appreciated the manner. You always had a certain flair, a certain style that you just don’t see much nowadays.” 

She simply stares at him, immune to his efforts at flattery. 

“The Dark Lord has plans for Faustus and your witch.”  
“I know, he stripped her of her power.”  
“Oh, that? **That** was for you, Lilith. No, he has plans for Faustus, and if you should suffer, all the better for it. Has she told you yet about the babe in the woods?” He sees her jaw set, “I’ll take that as a no. Come along Spot.” He whistles for the remaining demon to join him as they begin to walk along the path of the creek where the sound of the water hiding their voices. “That’s Buddy,” she corrects, eyeing the demon who is currently hiding behind his master’s legs. “What’s this about a baby?”“That is for your witch to tell you… if Faustus doesn’t find out first.”  
“And if he does?”  
“He’ll cheerfully murder her and her whole family?” Maury shrugs, “And he’d be well within his rights to do so.”  
“So he kills the Spellmans, so what?” Lilith rolls her eyes, “Why are you telling me this?”  
“I just thought you’d care?”  
“For some witches? No, I don’t.”  
“Perhaps I’ve misread the situation?”

They continue walking.

“I just assumed you missed it as much as I did. When the world was ours and when Darkness reigned over every living thing.”  
“Darkness still reigns, Maury, it’s everywhere. You can’t swing a dead demon without it landing in some type of evil.”  
“This isn’t Darkness, or evil, Lilith. This is banality. This is greed run amok and mindlessness. This is casual human cruelty. Do you remember when it was more? When we did more? I am tired and I am bored, Lilith. We all are. And for what? So he can lay with his daughter-bride?”  
“His…?” Her stomach churns, her head begins to spin, but she holds on to a tree branch to ground herself.  
“Lilith…” His voice bends slightly, one could say it softened if his voice was even capable of such things. “You knew that’s what he sent you here for, yes?” 

Oh.

“You didn’t.” He answers his own question. “Rachel and Leah are not the only ones to make an offering…”  
“I don’t believe you, her father was Edward Spellman.”  
“No, it’s not.” He grins at her, taking pleasure from her pain - he doesn’t try to hide it, he knows she’d have done the same if their positions were switched. “This was the step that was too far for us, Lilith. We’re demons, but we’re not _monsters_. That sort of behaviour is more fitting for their lot than ours. Not even animals…”  
“So?” She shrugs, pushing her mind to clarity, to get through whatever this is. “What am I supposed to do with this? Let’s skip ahead to where you tell me what this all about.”  
“Remember Russia, say a hundred years ago…?” His eyes gleam, his black lips pull back into a smile. “Didn’t we have fun?”  
“Why me?” She counters his question with one of her own.  
“Why not?”  
“You’re not afraid of getting caught?” She scoffs.  
“Are you?”  
“You don’t know what he’ll do to me.”  
“I do. We all do. The question is, will you let him this time around?”

Let? Lilith’s hands curl into fists, her nails digging into her palm. What does he know of consent? Of permitting. There is no permitting when it’s the Dark Lord when he’s the everything, the Alpha and the Omega. What is choice, when there is none? And what do men, even those of the Demonic variety know of choice?

“No.” She answers before she moves around him and begins to make her way across the creek, summoning the water to stay still enough to support her steps. “You’re setting me up.”  
“Would I have to go this far to do that?” He asks, “I could just let you stay up here and watch you as you watch as Faustus Blackwood sires the strongest Demon known to our kind with that Witch of yours while Satan himself punishes you in your failure to secure him his child-bride.”  
“I don’t fail.” She spits out from the other side of the creek, her mind racing at the idea of … All of it.  
“You have so far. Why is that? Is your heart not in the game anymore? Join the club…” He holds his arms out in a welcoming gesture, “There’s more of us than you’d think.”  
“I don’t trust you.”  
“I barely trust me. I certainly don’t trust _you_. But of all the demons in Hell, you’re the only one I’d plan a coupe with…”  
“Why not Bael? Or Bilet? Or even Asmodeus? He’s always ready for a fight.”  
“Exactly. They’re messy and loudmouthed. They lack a certain…” He searches for the right word.  
“Charisma? Charm? The propensity to get set up?”  
“Subtlety.” He snarks back, rolling his massive eyes.  
“Like the way you’re subtly trying to get me to betray the Dark Lord? Never.”  
“Alright,” He shrugs, “I can wait another couple of hundred years, no skin off my snout. But how much longer can you last as the Dark Lord’s whipping girl? How about your witch? Do you think she can last another 300 years as the broodmare to Faustus Blackwood? You think about it, Lilith. Isn’t it about time?” He bows to her in mocking gesture before he and Buddy walk off to disappear into the darkness of the trees.

Lilith stands for a minute, listening intently to the woods. Everything is as it should be, not a sound out of place. She allows herself to breathe. 

In and then out. 

In and then out. 

She turns around and continues her walk home, her mind a perfect blank until she makes it back to the refuge of her cottage. She re-wards the building after entering, refusing to be taken off guard by the Dark Lord again. She strips out of her clothes, and out of her skin as she seats herself primly on the couch. 

There.

Now she can think. Now she can think all about the outlandish lies Maury told her. Satan being Sabrina’s father?! Hardly likely. It’s not the how’s, the mechanics of that are surprisingly simple, if unreliable. But the why’s? Why would he want a half-breed of a child? Why would he want to sleep with - her mind reels and tells her it can’t be true, but her soul, what’s left of it twists, know it’s real. 

Her stomach churns at the thought. Does anyone know the things she had to do for him? To keep him happy? To keep him interested? 

No. 

No one knows of the unfathomable, horrible things. Still, she had done it all, lovingly, willingly, if it pleased him. If it kept him hers. But it didn’t, it wasn’t enough. She wasn’t enough. Nothing she had, nothing she could give would ever be enough. Even if she presented Sabrina to him, dressed in vestal virginal white… It would never be enough. 

Her heart doesn’t break, it’s in anguish, yes, but it doesn’t break at the thought. 

Her mind, however, it whirls. 

It spins. 

It races so far ahead of her she doesn’t recognize the thoughts that it thinks. That she’s even thinking. Thoughts like she cannot imagine a world without Lucifer Morningstar in it… But neither could he, and how that could and would be his biggest downfall. 

No.

It was one thing for the Dark Lord to command her to act on his behalf, for his betterment. She had carte blanche and religious righteousness on her side. She had never once hesitated to lie, maim, murder for the Dark Lord, she would do whatever was needed. She had done whatever was needed. But now, left unmoored and aimless, with no guidance, no direction, she is lost. Her decisiveness came from her belief in him, in all he was… But what was he now? Who was he now? She can no longer deny that this is not the same Lucifer who found her in the desert, wandering as he was. The same Lucifer who loved her and crowned her. The same Lucifer who left her on her own when the floods came, and the fires after that. The same Lucifer who left her to fend for herself amongst the Kings and Princes and Dukes of Hell. The same Lucifer who had her secure his future bride for him. She could continue to believe in him, eyes open to the truth of him, to his reign. 

Or…

No. There is no or. Her mind jumps tracks to Zelda, overwhelmed by the previous topic. The idea of Zelda marrying Faustus and having his children? She laughs, even as she remembers Zelda mentioning the path the Dark Lord had laid before her. She bolts upright and races to the bathroom where she vomits up the remnants of dinner and an ungodly amount of popcorn from her evening at the Spellmans. She vomits her lunch from before that, and when that’s worked its way out of her body, she vomits up bile and clear acid and fear and snot. Her knees are sore and her back hurts as she hunches over the too-short toilet, her stomach cramping, her head spinning from being upside down, her brain pounding from the tears. When did those start, she thinks to herself. She didn’t know she could still do that - cry - and honestly, it scares her to no end. She’s terrified because now that she’s started, she doesn’t know if it will ever stop. She curls up on the cold tile of the bathroom floor and prays to herself that this will pass. 

She knows now.

She wishes she didn’t, but she knows now. The source of her fear and terror suddenly very, very clear. It’s Zelda Spellman. It’s not just attraction, or lust (though there’s so much of that that her whole, confused body throbs with want). It’s something vast and echoing within the hollows of her body, her bones - and she wants to fill it with Zelda. She wants to lie with her and rest. 

Rest. Is that even possible?

She wants to slide into that bed and wrap her body around the others. She wants so many disgusting things - to run a finger over her lips, to count her lashes, to hear her heartbeat and her breath in the middle of the night. She wants to see her at the height of her powers, lit by hellfire. She wants… 

She wants. 

She wants like the wanting of Rumi. She wants like the wanting of every poet, every singer, every artist. Of every soul who wanted what they could not have, and would not stop. She wants Zelda. Why, she doesn’t know, but she does. This wanting and this witch are both beneath her, but she can do no more about it than she could do about being a demon. It was what it was.

It was what it was always going to be.

Her body begins to calm itself down, worn out by the efforts of the evening. She lies there rolling over onto her back, breathing in and breathing out until the sun begins to rise, She tracks it as it enters from the window, a tiny sliver of light that crawls closer and closer to her, until she lies in the warmth of the sun, smiling.

She breathes in and she breathes out.

Her mind slowly clears, until it’s as clear as it’s ever been. That’s the power of righteous anger, isn’t it? The righteous anger of the ages. And it has been ages. It has been since the day Lilith was created and cast out, hasn’t it? It’s the righteous anger of those who find themselves held down by injustice, of neglect, of abuse. Of those who are accused of being cursed, unclean, unholy. No wonder Satan appealed to them, but that was just another trick of his, isn’t it? Another means of disenfranchisement? So hidden, so understated that it took her eons to see the truth of the matter. All it took was to displease Lucifer - and with that, her rights, Zelda’s powers, Sabrina’s freedom were all on the table to be taken. Hell only knows who else, what else has been taken by the hooves of Satan.

She knows one day Maury might turn on her, thousands of years in the future. But so be it. She’ll have him killed before then. Or he might kill her. Who knows? Only time will tell… He’s an agent of chaos - it’s why they’ve always gotten along so well - but chaos isn’t a bad thing. No, it’s a chance for something new, something new, something long overdue.

The thoughts begin to fit within her, settle down into her bones, her soul. Her muscles tighten, getting ready for the action they know is beginning to brew, knowing soon they’ll be called upon. It feels good. It feels right. It’s been so long (too long) since something has made sense, since she has known her mind. There’s a sense of clarity amid the confusion. It’s not just the act of listening to herself, of realizing the truth of her situation, of what must be done. It’s the act of taking control, of doing something. Of doing what _she_ wants. 

She breathes in and she breathes out.

And she smiles.  


* * *

  


  
“Oh, and who to take down with me. I have made my list.”  
\- Margaret Atwood, The Testaments  
  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **AN3:** The film is ‘Notorious’, but Alfred Hitchcock, which at the time had the longest ‘kiss’ because he managed to skirt the rules by having Ingrid Bergman and Cary Grant hold a conversation with their mouthes millimetres apart… Anyways, an amazing movie, and well worth the watch if you can get your hands on it. Originally it was going to be ‘The Lady Eve’, a comedy again, about deception and false identities, but as the subtext of the chapter changed, needed something more serious. Anyways, both are brilliant!  
>  **AN4:** * This line is all but stolen from Akwaeke Emezi’s essay on The Cut entitled ‘Transition’ about their … Well, their transition.


End file.
